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My first hunts in Colorado

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My first hunts in Colorado

Postby saddlesore » 02 27, 2023 •  [Post 1]

I will see if I have any photos and will add them later if so.


In 1973, I could see the handwriting on the wall while I was working for Sandia National Labs. There were about 3000 people there and layoffs were starting. Elk tags were getting hard to draw.
I took some poetic license with my resume and sent it to a little company in Colorado Springs that had about 300 people. They asked me to come for an interview in early January 1974. In late January I gave my resignation at Sandia on a Friday and started to work at Kaman Sciences on the following Monday.

My wife, two kids, and I rented a house in a small community south of Colorado Springs and I boarded my horse at a ranch that is now the Colorado Springs airport. We then bought a house with two half acre lots further south near Fountain, Colorado. Then next year we were divorced. My ex-wife took the two the two kids and moved back to Pennsylvania. I was remarried later in the year.

My new neighbor was a home builder, but he had an outfitter's license also. He owned a campground in southern Colorado near La Veta, and invited me to tag along with him that first year.It turned out to be nothing but trail riding and seeing no elk .

This was a whole new ball game for elk hunting. There was no E-scouting, Google Earth, or Online Topo maps back then. I did not know any elk hunters nor much about the state and where to hunt. I bought some National Forest maps and became familiar with a few areas.

Having good luck in New Mexico hunting wilderness areas, I stuck a pin in the map of extreme northern Colorado in the Zirkel Wilderness. In early July, I scouted it out. I loaded up the family, hitched the horse trailer to my 70 Dodge and loaded my horse, Sugarfoot. I had the kids for the summer, so they were thrilled about a trip to the mountains.

Following a Forest Service map, we located an access road that led us west from Walden, Colorado into the Routt National Forest and a parking area at a trailhead leading into the Zirkel Wilderness.

I packed the horse and the four of us hiked into Bear Lake at about 10,000 feet.

First, I found that it was an extremely rugged country. Next, I found winter snows do not melt by early July and we slogged through some nasty drifts to get to the lake. Then we found that the high country in Colorado had major infestations of mosquitoes at that time of year. Only planning on sleeping under a lean-to tarp, that proves rather bothersome. The kids adapted and were having a ball in the snow drifts as there had not been much snow in New Mexico. The new wife, not so much. Fishing was great and I glassed several herds of elk that had moved up following the snow melt.

That fall I invited Jim, who was my hunting partner in New Mexico, to come to Colorado and elk hunt with me. In a previous tale, I mentioned Jim did not hunt with me again. I remembered this hunt while looking through albums for photos of my hunts. I had bought another horse that summer, and Jim brought his horse along. My boss, Ray, at the time wanted to go and he had his own horse. I figured if he went, I would be assured of getting time off work.

We all bought general bull tags. I had most of the gear, and we pitched money into a pot for me to buy all the groceries. Jim made sure I took enough of his oatmeal.

Again, we left on a Wednesday, so we could get more familiar with trails and country and get the camp set up. I still had the hex military tent. We packed it along with food, gear, and some grain for the horses, on my pack horse and rode the other three with personal gear on them. Our heat was the Coleman stove and a little propane catalytic heater that used the one-pound bottles.

The first two days were rain mixed with snow and we didn't get much hunting done. Monday, we got out before first light and rode up to timber line about a mile. Not being familiar with the country and where the elk were, we split up once we had the horses tied.

Before leaving New Mexico, I had bought a Winchester Model 70 in seven mm mag. Jim was shooting his .270. Ray had borrowed his FIL's 300 Win Mag.

The weather was still pretty miserable. The trees were wet, and snow was dropping off them. It wasn't long until I was sitting under my pauncho shivering.

About nine AM, I heard four shots not far off. Silence and then another three shots. It came from where Ray had headed, and I figured he had one down. After waiting a bit, maybe a half hour, I headed up Ray's way. I found him in that high country brush that was three or four feet high. There was a little clearing, maybe seventy-five yards away, completely torn up with elk tracks.

I saw no dead elk, but Ray was excited and started talking a mile a minute. I finally got the story out of him. A bull elk came past him and stopped in the clearing. Ray had emptied his rifle at the elk, missing each time as the elk was doing that trick of deciding which way to go not knowing where the sound came from. The elk ran off a ways and stopped. Ray had reloaded and shot another three times before the elk left the country down over the mountain. There was still enough snow on the ground that after an hour or so of looking, we found no blood.

That ended the hunt for the day. Everyone was wet and cold. Back at camp, we some how got a fire started with enough dry wood to burn long enough to dry us out.

We were in a small valley with a creek in the bottom. Figuring a few more rifle shots were not going to spook any elk that were left nearby, we set up a paper plate across the stream against an old downed tree to check Ray's rifle. It was maybe thirty -forty yards away. The first two shots did not hit the plate. After a lot of searching we found spots in the dirt a couple feet away. Ray fired a few more rounds with no better results. I asked him if he had checked the rifle before the hunt and he told us his father in law said it was sighted in so he didn't bother. Great!!! Ray had only brought one box of ammo for it and with seven already gone, we were able to get at least hitting the plate. Leaving him with only a few rounds to finish the hunt.

The following day we spent riding to different vantages points then glassing looking for elk. We found a few other hunting camps, but no elk. Figuring the elk might have dropped down a bit to get out of the previous storm, the next day we rode down the trail a ways and cut off into a side canyon. Each taking a different direction, we headed off into some thick timber.

I had maybe gone a half mile or so, moving slow, when I started to see some fresh droppings and tracks.There was a enough snow left on the ground to see which way the elk were moving. After a bit, I could see a few elk moving through the trees, but not enough to tell if any bulls were with them. I was cross wind to them so they had not caught my scent. I played cat and mouse with them for awhile but could never get close enough to see more. The way they were moving, not in a straight line, I figured they were close to bedding down. Not wanting to bust them out and drive them away, I backed out to try and make a plan to get around them.

Mid morning I had worked my way back to the horses and met Jim and Ray. Jim had the same experience as I had, but Ray had seen no elk.

We rode back up the trail, past camp, and headed high enough cut around to the head of the canyon. We could not find anyway to drop down far enough to get to the elk. The only solution was to head back to where we were the next day, but climb higher and get above the elk to where we could see them. We returned to camp with a little more enthusiasm for at least finding elk.

That evening, I started to feel poorly and it wasn't long before I was throwing up. Not wanting to bother the others to put up with me leaving the tent every few minutes, I moved my bed roll outside under the tarp we had set up to keep the saddles dry. It was a miserable night and I didn't feel much better in the morning. I decided to stay in camp for the day. Ray and Jim went out hunting looking for the elk that Jim had seen the previous day. They returned in the afternoon and had no luck, but I was feeling a bit better.

When the alarm rattled the next morning, I peek out from the tent and could see stars.Whatever I had, seem to have worked out and I was feeling a lot better. We hurried breakfast. I had already wasted a day and wanted to get back to the elk. Jim wanted to go with me, and Ray wanted to go back to where he missed the bull on opening day. We wished each other luck and set off.

I had looked at the topo maps and located a little ridge that angled up not far from where we had tied up a few days earlier. Jim was to go up the other side of the canyon and we would meet later in a bowl at the end.

Climbing higher than where I saw the elk the few days ago, I side lined along a bench below the rock cliffs. From above, I could see down into the timber and several little clearings. About a half mile further, it opened up more.That is when I saw the elk feeding a good two hundred fifty-three hundred yards away. I could not go straight much further as the thermals were still drifting down and the elk would catch my scent. Dropping off the bench I cut a forty five degree towards the elk, not knowing that Jim was just about parallel to me five hundred yards or so across the canyon. He had seen the elk and was working towards them.

Getting closer I could see three small, but legal bulls, in the group of some cows and few a spikes.They were not aware of me yet nor Jim, and Jim and I were not aware of each other. I was shaking a fair amount with elk fever and anticipation. Moving only a few feet at a time, I found a spot that offered a good sight lane and a stump to rest my rifle. It felt like hours, but probably only a few minutes until I could line up on a bull with out a cow in the way.

At the time I had a Weaver V-7 scope mounted on the seven mag and had it turned up to the full seven power. When the cow stepped clear and I had the cross hairs centered in the crease behind the shoulder of the bull, I sent a 175 grain Sierra Game King on it's way. The bull did a death run of twenty or thirty yards and piled up in some small spruce.

The remaining elk headed off and eventually worked their way to the bowl at the end of the canyon which was not very far.Then they curled back around to the side, right into Jim. I had only just reached the bull I shot when I heard Jim's 270 crack. He later told me the elk went on both sides of him with two bulls following. He shot one at less than thirty yards.

There we were with two bulls down. Both bulls barely made five by fives. Jim had heard me shoot, was ready for them, and I was fairly certain he did not miss. I did not worry about Jim taking care of his elk. He was about six-two, and packed lot of weight. None of it fat.

I punched my tag and dug some rope out of my day pack to tie the legs up, then cut a few small trees with my hand axe to get enough room to gut and skin the elk. By this time the gutting wasn't so big of a job and I had become pretty proficient at it. However, I was still struggling some, finishing up, when Jim showed up. He had his gutted and spread open and had cut cross the canyon, up and down, to me, before I was finished. With two working we had mine skinned and quartered in short order. Game bags were back in the saddle bags with the horses, so we laid the quarters on some light poly sheet I had in my pack. Then off across the valley to repeat the process with Jim's elk. It was getting on to late afternoon by the time we finished, so we hurried back to the horses to get the game bags. We were able to bush whack, riding the two horses to both elk. After bagging the quarters, we had them hanging in the shade within a couple hours. Then headed for camp, with one of the livers, hoping to at least get on the main trail before dark.

We just about made it, but unsaddled in the dark then got the horses watered and picketed out to graze. Ray had no luck and had returned mid afternoon. He had a good welcomed fire going and offered to cook supper. As tired as we were, we took him up on his offer.

We slept in the next day a bit, and decided that since the elk were in the same direction as the trucks, we would pack the two elk back to the main trail and hang the quarters off in the timber to pack out later.We still had to cut the antlers off both bulls with a cross cut saw. Doing that and having only one a pack horse it took most of the day. Ray had wanted to hunt up higher again, but had not found any elk.

That evening Ray said he wanted to give it one more day. He wasn't in very good shape and getting tired. That country could sure wear a person out quick. Jim and I decided we would pack the two elk down to the trail head.

The next morning, Jim and I saddled up and rode down to the two elk trailing my pack horse. We loaded two hind quarters in the panniers on the pack horse with a set of antlers on top and lashed two front quarters to my riding saddle. Jim wanted a hide, so he rolled one up and tied it behind his saddle. It was all down hill and only about three miles, so I walked out. After locking the meat in the horse trailer's tack room and our rifles in the trucks, we rode back up to the second elk and repeated the process, but then Jim walked out.

Mid afternoon we were back in camp. Ray had returned with no luck of finding elk and said he had enough of elk hunting. We had liver and onions again that evening and started to get our gear collected to pack out the next day.

In the last few days, the weather had cleared up considerably. The pack out was warm and pleasant. The trail had dried out and the sun was shining. A perfect way to end an elk hunt.

Ray's father in law lived near Cheyenne Wells in eastern Colorado. He was a rancher and had a full butcher shop with a walk in cooler. We each gave Ray a hind quarter from our elk and Ray headed out in that direction. Jim and I headed home. He had another four hours to drive to Albuquerque from my place, so he stayed over night and left the next morning.

In the next several years, I hunted that country again a few times with not much luck. I decided it was too rugged for the effort involved with not many elk.
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saddlesore
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Re: My first hunts in Colorado

Postby Swede » 02 28, 2023 •  [Post 2]

Another interesting elk hunt. Thanks for sharing it with us.
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Re: My first hunts in Colorado

Postby 7mmfan » 02 28, 2023 •  [Post 3]

Loving the stories Saddlesore.
I hunt therefore I am. I fish therefore I lie.
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Re: My first hunts in Colorado

Postby Swede » 03 01, 2023 •  [Post 4]

As I have followed Vince's stories, I see some parallels with my own elk hunting experience. In his earliest elk hunting experiences, Vince had some success. He was in the right area with experienced elk hunters. Then he went to a new area and under the right conditions he got more elk.
Then something happened. He hit a dry spell. He got no elk for a while.
That is not exactly how it went for me, but my story is similar.
That dry spell we experience is every bit as important as the fruitful times. The dry times are where we learn. In those times we suspect something is wrong, but we don't know what. Why are some hunters consistently getting elk and not us? Do they have a special hunting location or do they just know something? Maybe they are cheating but that doesn't seem reasonable. It is frustrating.
We are still hunting hard, and maybe even harder, but things are not coming together. Shootergirl and others here have lamented the fruitless seasons, but if we pay attention to everything and learn, they can turn out to be the foundation for a successful elk hunting career. The clues are all out there or we can get them by listening or reading. Keep in mind that everything someone does that ends in success is not applicable in your case. Adapt and apply as warranted.
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Re: My first hunts in Colorado

Postby saddlesore » 03 01, 2023 •  [Post 5]

My dry spell was only 2 years or so. Most if it was not knowing where to hunt. A couple of good people pointed me in the right direction and after that I did OK. I will relate some of those hunts in the future.

The worst problem I had to overcome was moving too fast while still hunting. When you start to see elk looking at you or bedded down without a clue you are around, instead of seeing elk butts going away, or crashing thru the timber, you know you are going slow enough. I saw a lot elk butts though. For many young people that I helped getting started elk hunting, that was the hardest thing they learned also
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Re: My first hunts in Colorado

Postby 7mmfan » 03 01, 2023 •  [Post 6]

saddlesore wrote:My dry spell was only 2 years or so. Most if it was not knowing where to hunt. A couple of good people pointed me in the right direction and after that I did OK. I will relate some of those hunts in the future.

The worst problem I had to overcome was moving too fast while still hunting. When you start to see elk looking at you or bedded down without a clue you are around, instead of seeing elk butts going away, or crashing thru the timber, you know you are going slow enough. I saw a lot elk butts though. For many young people that I helped getting started elk hunting, that was the hardest thing they learned also


That is hard, it's hard for almost everyone. The nuances of it get lost as well on new hunters. When do you need to slow down? Obviously you can't hunt at a snails pace all day through areas that might be void of life? If you only covered 1/2 mile in a whole day in an area with nothing it, that's a waste of time. The trick is learning WHEN to slow down. You indicated it in your story, moving through the timber until you started finding fresh sign and then slowing down. Experience will tell you what areas on a mountain or canyon to slow down in as well, areas likely to hold animals.
I hunt therefore I am. I fish therefore I lie.
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Re: My first hunts in Colorado

Postby Swede » 03 01, 2023 •  [Post 7]

I agree with you characters. When you are consistently seeing elk butts moving out; you are moving too fast.
When and where to call is more important than having the perfect sound. When to stay quiet and not call is even more difficult for at least some hunters to get right. They think they are the Pied Piper of elk and just have to be making noise. Calling from your tree stand is the perfect way to get elk to hang up just out of bow range.
Leaving your decoy in camp and not bringing it to your tree stand location is another mistake it took me a while to learn. It cost me a couple of elk.
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