This year while scouting with my buddy, Dick Riese, we got permission to hunt on a new property. This place has CRP fields up on the top of the ridge and a steep wooded hill curving from east to north to west. The hill has some dozed trails going around it, making for easier walking for us and the deer.

We usually park on the south side and walk to the east edge of the CRP and head north, then we angle northeast down into the woods to get to the bulldozed trail. I had placed a stand 200 yards north and farther downhill from our woods entry point, next to a lower trail.

I only hunted the stand a few times and only saw some does at a distance. I was walking in at about 3:45 pm on Sat. Nov. 8. I had started angling down into the woods and was almost to the trail when I heard a noise in front of me. I looked up to see a doe in the trail, staring at me. She ran off downhill to my right, and then I heard a grunt off to my left! I looked over there to see a tall narrow 9 point rack and the head of the buck looking my direction from about 18 yards! He had not seen me, but wondered what had scared the doe. He turned to see where the doe went, and I ducked down to the ground. I was not ready for action (MY MISTAKE). I was carrying my homemade Cat quiver in my left hand with my bow. I held the quiver on the ground with my left and pulled an arrow out with my right hand, knocked it on the string, looked up over the weeds to see the top of the buck’s head and antlers in the middle of the trail, looking my direction! He turned his head to see where the doe went, then turned away from me on the trail, went 8 yards, then turned right down through the woods. If I had thought faster, all I would have had to do was stand up when he turned his head, and I would have had a clear broadside shot at 16 yards!!! I missed my chance that day.

The next day I put a stand up in a big pine tree about 35 yards downhill and 20 yards north, right next to the intersection of 2 bulldozed trails and the head of a steep ditch. I hunted it that night and Dick hunted it a few times during the week, but all we saw were a few does and a couple 3 pointers.

I went in the next Saturday mourning, had a doe go through at about 25 yards, then at 8:10 coming down the trail from my right (north) was that same 9 pointer. He was moving at a fast steady walk, and went by my left side at 14 yards. Even though I had taken a doe the first weekend, I still wanted to get some more venison for the freezer. He was not a P&Y buck, but he was big bodied, at least a 3 1/2 year old, so I picked my spot and let the arrow go. He took off downhill, made about 80 yards in 6 or 7 seconds and dropped on the next bulldozed trail. We boned him out in the woods (a lot easier than dragging or carting him up a steep hill). I am glad he dropped where he did because the hill gets very steep on the downhill side of that trail. I rolled the remains downhill off the trail, and they rolled for 25 yards before they came to a stop!!

The buck must have gone close to 230 pounds live weight, because although I didn’t get every scrap of meat off the deer, I still carried out 83 pounds of meat.

On my hunts this fall, I used my 58# 56″ Jason Kendall bow and the arrows were made by Bill Anderson’s son Nathan. Nathan made them when he was about 12 years old while working at our booth at the IOWA DEER CLASSIC, which he then donated to the club auction where I purchased them.

Gene, the picture is not fully in focus, so you may want to keep it small, say no more than 5″ by 6″.

Jerry

2008 was the second year our group of traditional archers had applied for an archery permit to hunt elk in the Flattops Wilderness area of Colorado. In 2007, we had been unsuccessful in drawing permits, but had opted to buy over-the-counter licenses and hunt a different wilderness area. Kevin Anderson, Doug Hulshizer and myself had had what I considered a very successful hunt with Kevin taking a nice 5×5 bull.

This year, Doug Hulshizer had to stay home and Tim Hill was going instead. We backpacked in a couple of days prior to the season to our base camp site. The next day, I came back to the trailhead and packed in my portable treestand and a cow elk decoy. I hung the stand that afternoon over a bog in preparation for the opening day on Saturday. After a day of stump shooting on Friday, I felt ready to hunt on Saturday, which was extremely warm. I heard bugling early Saturday in the creek drainage to the south of my treestand, but saw no elk. Kevin had heard the bugling, also, but had no shooting opportunities. Tim reported seeing a lot of other bow hunters, but no elk.

Sunday I sat in the same location and, once again, heard bugling to the south of my stand. Kevin reported seeing an outfitter’s pack train in the area and Tim got within 20 yards of a nice 6×6 bull with his bow at full draw, but the bull stopped with a pine bough blocking a shot to his vitals. That afternoon, I moved my treestand and decoy to a park south of me about where I thought the bugling had been coming from each morning. I put my treestand overlooking a clearing on the south edge of the park. The area to the west of my stand was very thick and brushy timber.

Monday morning dawned very windy with a cold front moving in from the northwest. I took a spill in the dark while heading for my treestand that morning sending my bow, a Jim Brackenbury recurve, flying. I decided I had better slow down and reached my treestand about 6:45 a.m. I set up my silhouette cow elk decoy and climbed into my treestand. As I was pulling up my bow, I heard a crashing noise to the south of me and looked up to see a large cow elk running off to the west. As I sat down with an arrow on the string, a large calf elk ran out of the brush to the northwest of me and ran under my treestand heading to the southeast. No sooner than the calf had disappeared in the trees, a cow elk appeared to the southwest. She approached my stand from the back side in the brush while staring at my decoy. She stopped just below my stand behind a log. A branch blocked a shot to her chest with the angle not being good anyway. I realized as I waited for her to turn, that my safety strap was going to impact my ability to draw since I was almost facing the tree my stand was in. All of a sudden, the cow spun around and took off to the west as if someone had thrown scalding water on her. At first I thought she had smelled me, but then I looked down and realized the gusting wind was causing my decoy to shake intermittently.

After the cow ran off, I tried pulling my bow while facing the spot where she had stood. I found I could do it, but not easily due to the safety strap binding on my arm. I had no sooner sat down than I heard a loud bugle only a hundred yards to the south and I spotted a nice rack moving through the trees to the south. The bull approached my decoy from the same direction as the cow—stopping almost in the same spot below my stand. I stood facing him with my bow ready, waiting for the bull to spook and run off the next time the decoy shook. As he spun around to run off, he exposed his chest and I snap-shot him behind the front leg. The grizzly-tipped arrow protruded from his side as he ran off to the west and quickly disappeared.

After 45 minutes, I followed along his path of flight looking for blood. After a hundred yards, I had found no arrow, blood or any other sign and became very concerned. The bull had run along a ridge to the west and when I walked out into an aspen park at the end of the ridge, I could look down and see the bull lying just over the crest of the ridge.

As I walked down to the bull, I suddenly realized how big his body really was. I estimated he weighed between 900 and 1,000 pounds. I thanked the Good Lord for this gift, took pictures, and began the boning-out process. I started the boning at 8:30 a.m. and did not finish until roughly 3:30 p.m. I was totally exhausted and had to move the game bags of meat up the mountain to a patch of dark timber. I lacked the strength after considerable effort to hang the game bags of meat up in a tree. So, I was forced to make a bed of pine boughs to lay the meat bags on.

I got back to camp after dark–totally soaked from rain and hail that had started falling. With help from my teammates, I got some warm food and crawled into my sleeping bag praying that the coyotes and bears wouldn’t find the meat.

The next day, we each made two trips with packs of meat. The boned-out meat weighed 328 pounds.

This was the first shot I had taken in my five years of hunting elk in Colorado. I used a Grizzly Broadhead on an Easton full metal jacket shaft. Total arrow weight was 650 grains. The recurve bow was a Jim Brackenbury original bought in 1990, pulling 62 pounds @ 28″.

Here is a pic of my first Colorado Archery Elk. My group (Doug W. and Doug H.) was in CO wilderness for 11 days. We saw a few elk and other critters. I shot this elk on day 2 of the season. It took 2 days to process and remove the meat from the wilderness (via back packs) and take it to the meat locker. We estimate we carried out around 170 lbs of meat. We rough scored it around 170 (P&Y requires 260). It was in a satellite bull group. I had to stalk up and then chase after the bulls to get a shot at this one. I probably covered 250 yards in pursuit of the bulls before I had a chance to make a shot. I plan to do a scull cap mount of this bull and hang it in the living room. The other guys in the group had a few encounters, but didn’t get any shots.

Good luck this fall!

Later,

Kevin A.

Troops, my FIRST kill with the osage bow I made and the coyotes beat me to her. We have a serious coyote problem in these parts as you can see. I shot this deer at sundown Friday night and was unable to pick up a blood trail in the dark. Very nasty brushy area. The next morning I did finally find blood but sparse. After 3 hours tracking for about a half mile I found her. She had been stripped clean and the obvious sign in the area was that a pack of coyotes had a field day. How are you guys doing on your hunting?

Jim

Gene this is a picture of the buck I shot October 28, 2006 he green scored 151 2/8. I am having him mounted by Brincks Taxidermy so I haven’t had a chance to get him officially scored.