Looking for a little Utah help.

[Steve G]

I drew a Monroe/Dutton/Plateau cow elk tag. I am looking for a little help as I have never been before.

We are looking not only to take a couple cows but also learn the area for future bull hunt.

We have three or four days to hunt and are looking to narrow the huge area down to a workable hunting area. We will be there on 10/12 - 10/14 at a minimum ( four days after the opener). One of the things I see on the maps is far more back country roads than I am accustomed to. I feel like if I start hiking away from one road I am soon hiking towards another. The hunt is any legal weapon hunt and we will be hunting with rifles with appropriate power.

Anything you might care to share with me about behavior, geography, pressure or any other characteristics which might be relevant to the area and time of year is appreciated.

Thanks,
Steve G

[Charina]

Huge is almost an understatement. I'm not sure you could drive all the roads in the area in four days if you tried.

Really, you need to narrow down which of the four bull units within that massive cow area you want to target, and focus in on that. Mt Dutton, Monroe, Plateau - Fishlake/Thousand Lake, and Plateau- Boulder. All of them have good bulls. Yes, a lot of UT units have lots of roads. It can be a challenge looking for the pockets of road-less areas. But those pockets can be pretty sweet, esp since so many stick close to the roads. Fortunately though, given the way these units are run, the pressure isn't that great during the big bull hunts in Sep.

If you are wanting to get lost in large near-wilderness tracts, then perhaps Mt Dutton is your choice. I've never been on it, but I do hear it is quite rugged and difficult to navigate. But there are a couple very large areas best accessed by horses or young legs. Good option for remote bulls, not the greatest option for short 3-4 day hunt.

Fishlake and Monroe both have reputations for good bulls. I've been on fishlake a couple times, but mostly for fishing. Plenty of good habitat and elk numbers are good on both. Not a thing wrong with either unit (aside from the fact I would like to see some roads closed to provide more undisturbed habitat).

Boulder . . . there's no elk on Boulder, don't bother. I jest. It's the one I have hunted for general season spikes and know better. It's gaining a reputation for better bulls, but I'm not sure it's warranted as compared to other units. Where I find the elk, it's thick. Little or no opportunities for glassing or driving. At least not where the elk are. A lot of people hunt up top between Boulder Mt and Griffen Top. I think that is only because there is lots of roads, relatively flat, and many large open areas. That's why I avoid it, and avoiding it is probably why I find elk.

Cow tag allocations for 2016 were cut on all four of the units that comprise the cow hunt. The herds are not hurting, but they are not as high as they have been in the last couple years. Still, you shouldn't have trouble finding cows if you work for it. The cow tag cuts really screwed with my plans this year though.

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Do you realize that each and every year you can pick up an OTC spike tag (except Monroe) and hunt these areas to get to know them better? Yeah, odds are not real great, but it is an option in addition to this year's cow hunt. In fact you could even pick up an archery OTC spike tag, and hunt both your spike tag, AND the cow tag from 8/20 to 9/9, and then come back again in Oct to hunt the cow tag with your rifle. You can fill a cow tag at the same time (and weapon) as an antlered tag you hold.

While the 10/8 opener for general season rifle spike hunting would definitely be busier than 10/12, I personally would want to be out there on 10/8. Why? I expect the bulls would still be pretty vocal the beginning of that second week of Oct. But from my limited experience, it begins to taper off fairly quickly in that second week. Perhaps it's the pressure. Perhaps it's the season progressing. Or both. But I've found in early Oct, it's pretty easy to key in on where the cows are when the bulls are giving away the location verbally. But if you value solitude more, Wednesday is a great option for starting the hunt. They should still be vocal, even if not as vociferous as the start of Oct.

[Steve G]

Thank you Charina for taking the time to respond as you did.

I am generally an opening day hunter but we have a WY pronghorn hunt in the days preceding. I really like the Dutton area for the reasons you describe but was told by another hunter who is familiar with the area (He referred to it as a deep hell hole) that if we pull one cow out of that area we would never want to go back While I am generally not timid about working hard, that place does look like a super steep rock hole and we have two tags.

I am leaning towards Monroe as there is no spike hunt in that unit, but also considering Fishlake because it is ultimately easier to draw for bulls than all the other units mentioned. Decisions, decisions.

You wrote, "Where I find the elk, it's thick. Little or no opportunities for glassing or driving." I was planning to glass, but perhaps I should rethink that. I have always heard people say stay out of the bedding areas. Since I don't know the area and therefore don't know the bedding area do you have any suggestions on how to hunt the heavy cover with out bumping into the bedding areas?

Thanks,
Steve G

[Charina]

Lets say you have a backyard farm. You have two objectives - 1) harvest as many large males as the small farm can produce, and 2) maximize the overall output of the farm. Those are the two objects of the state of UT with elk. Now, in your backyard farm, lets say you overfocus on #1, and really go for the maximization of the number of really large toms you can harvest from a turkey flock. So you don't cull excess young toms, and you don't harvest any hens. Eventually, your population is going to approach 50/50 males to females (sans the # of largest/oldest toms you harvest). Lets throw in some numbers to simplify - 100 turkeys total. And you harvest 1/5 of the toms each year as it takes 5 years to reach maximum size. Since you do, there is about 40 toms to 60 hens. How many chicks can those 60 hens produce? 4X60 = 240. (honestly, I don't know the number in a clutch, just throwing out simple numbers) Suddenly, your farm has way to many turkeys. You NEED to cull some otherwise most will starve to death from limited resources - esp when winter comes. Do you kill off the 4 year old and 3 year old toms to make room from upcomming young toms (spikes)? Do you kill off producing hens? Or do you let the youngsters get a little size and cull all of them, except the proportion you need to replace aging hens, and the 5 year old toms you harvest each year? Doing the latter lets you meet BOTH objectives, without a pending population crash.

Now lets say you manage for slightly fewer toms harvested each year, but want to fulfill objective 2 as well. Now you have 75 hens and 25 toms. You can harvest 5 toms (1/5th, as on 5 year cycle) instead of the 8 if the ratio is 40/60, and the 75 hens will produce 300 chicks now. You are now harvesting somewhere around 300 turkeys rather than 240 if you focus on objective 1 only. Sure, the huge tom harvest went down from 8 to 5, and that is all some people see. But I think it's short sighted.

Harvesting spikes allows for maximization of resource extraction without reducing the huge bull opportunities. I would argue that having huge numbers of 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 year old bulls around is simply using up resources that could be spent on cows, which produce more calves, which provides more opportunity for the average hunter, not just a slight increase for a few. Many of the top LE areas are close to being once-in-a-lifetime anyway unless you are young or lucky. That's not a viable option to manage the herds ONLY for the horn-porn crowd. I want to hunt ever year, not every 9th to 25th year.

It's hard to argue with the spike hunting given the results of the past. It is the paradigm under which the Monroe got to its stature. Unfortunately, some local public pressure overruled the professional biologists. It'll be an interesting experiment to watch play out over the next 5-8 years and see what the outcome is. My guess is that there WILL be more bulls. But objective 2 is kinda shot, and a large proportion of those bulls will be young 2-4 year old raghorns not really worth a 20 year wait. I mentioned before that Boulder is being touted as some as up and coming. That in spite of spike hunting. The same can be said for San Juan and every other top tier unit. Dutton has decreased some, but that is because the age objective was changed so they gave out more LE permits.

Me? An opinion on spike hunting? Perhaps just a little. I just see to many people arguing to cease harvesting any spike or cows, with the intent to maximize the number of large bulls that can be harvested, while missing the fact that in the long run that creates a lopsided herd that does not produce as much overall, and eventually may actually produce fewer high end bulls, and excludes the average joe (me) from hunting year to year. That bugs me.

There is no way around it - if hunters want numerous huge bulls to pick from, then the LE tags have to be cut to manage to a certain age class, whether or not spikes are harvested.

Yeah, I've heard of Dutton referred to as "the Rock". I was going to archery hunt there this year for spikes, but they cut the tags so drastically (same with Boulder) that I've made alternate plans so I can hunt two tags at once. You have to keep in mind that many UT resident hunters are used to the easy access of roads. So you have to decide if you are a typical weekend warrior sticking close to roads, or one that wants a near-wilderness experience where you can go deep, work hard, and have big bulls all to yourself.

I've never set foot on Monroe, so can't help there. There is still spike hunting, it's just archery. I think it was last year they shut down the rifle spike hunt. So, there might be a few more 2 year olds than previous years. Perhaps that will play out well depending on when you will have enough points to draw.

There are definitely glassing opportunities. But on Boulder, there are so many aspens, firs, and other brush where I find elk, there are only a few limited opportunities. It's not like it's all a monoculture high alpine fir, and certainly not open sage brush or grasslands. From what I've seen of Fishlake and the aspens, I think the same thing applies to much of it. But Fishlake has a lot more undulations to the landscape providing opportunities to get up high and overlook a valley (more like a canyon). Where there are gentle bowls that would be conducive to such, I think there are generally roads. I only bring binocs. Many bring a spotting scope, but only keep it at the truck.

Sometimes there are clear bedding areas in N. facing thick timber. Those are a given. Sometimes, they bed in what isn't the stereotypical CO bedding slope - just right in the aspens. Me . . . I don't worry so much about staying out of bedding cover. I used to buy into that, but no longer. I try to be low impact, but if I mess up and bump some, there is always the next herd not to far away. And you can't kill elk, where they are not. Better go where they are, and then hunt it intelligently. I don't go back to camp to nap midday. I stay out, and if they are in their beds, I'm not to far away trying to find an opportunity. But yeah, if it's some nasty hairy blow-down, hard to get into area, and it's dry and crunchy, I'm not going in there. That's not intelligent hunting.

[Steve G]

Laughing. I think that you misunderstood my spike elk comment. I don't have an opinion on it. I was just thinking that since there is no "rifle" spike hunt in that area there would be less hunting traffic / pressure.

Thanks again for the feedback.

[Charina]

Well . . . you could have told me that was the reasoning before I spent all that time! Do I have a sensitive spot with the non-residents screwing with the existing setup? Perhaps a little.

That is a valid point about pressure. But honestly, on a Wednesday-Fri isn't going to be very heavily pressured in any of the units. A lot of weekend warriors, and much fewer dedicated hunters. I still think you should pick where you want to hunt based on draw odds, terrain, and potential first, and then worry about pressure after that.

[Steve G]

I'll let you know when we do decide until then plenty of food for thought and I can say it all looks like beautiful country.

[TRDHUNTER]

I have hunted deer on the monroe and fishlake units. Been on limited entry elk hunts on fishlake, but have never hunted rifle elk or had cow tags on any of the units mentioned. If you are applying for big bull tag it will most likely take a while so you could hunt few years and see which unit you like best. Not sure on non-resident, but the Monroe has the worst draw odds of units mentioned for residents. Fishlake is easiest to draw of the units mentioned. I do not know much about the dutton other than the nickname "rockpile" but you should be able to find some cow elk on any of the units. The monroe does have quite a bit of private land on the unit, if that is a concern. If you decide to hunt Monroe or fishlake I could give you some places to start. I have only been on boulder few times and would like to learn it more, and have a few buddies who hunt it, but there is only so much time. Good luck with the search.