Mossy Oak Colorado Bull Elk

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U.P. MAN
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Mossy Oak Colorado Bull Elk

Unread postby U.P. MAN » Tue Oct 23, 2012 4:57 am

Not sure the whole story, he just sent me pics. Im sure a story will follow when he gets back.



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Black Squirrel
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Re: Mossy Oak Colorado Bull Elk

Unread postby Black Squirrel » Tue Oct 23, 2012 5:30 am

Sweet! :clap:
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Re: Mossy Oak Colorado Bull Elk

Unread postby Bucky » Tue Oct 23, 2012 9:53 am

8-)
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Re: Mossy Oak Colorado Bull Elk

Unread postby goldtip5575 » Tue Oct 23, 2012 9:59 am

cant wait for the story.congats to him...
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Re: Mossy Oak Colorado Bull Elk

Unread postby solocam88 » Tue Oct 23, 2012 10:12 am

Nice bull congrats

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Re: Mossy Oak Colorado Bull Elk

Unread postby Boo » Tue Oct 23, 2012 11:24 am

Nice bull!
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Re: Mossy Oak Colorado Bull Elk

Unread postby mossyoak » Mon Oct 29, 2012 7:53 pm

I will try and get the story posted in the next day ir two, i have just been busy since i got home that work thing is taking up a lot of my time.

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Re: Mossy Oak Colorado Bull Elk

Unread postby dan » Mon Oct 29, 2012 8:38 pm

Nice! Congrats! :clap:
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Re: Mossy Oak Colorado Bull Elk

Unread postby Bigdaddy-yoyo » Mon Oct 29, 2012 9:12 pm

Good eats there...congrats :D
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Re: Mossy Oak Colorado Bull Elk

Unread postby Swampthing » Mon Oct 29, 2012 9:29 pm

Nice bull.

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Re: Mossy Oak Colorado Bull Elk

Unread postby Liberty-Hunt » Mon Oct 29, 2012 9:41 pm

8-) :clap:
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Re: Mossy Oak Colorado Bull Elk

Unread postby mossyoak » Thu Nov 08, 2012 7:51 pm

Sorry it took so long for me to actually get time to sit down and type something up on this hunt. It has just been crazy all fall and since I have got back from colorado I have been going non stop between work and tryin to get out hunting. This hunt kind of just fell into my lap this year and worked out perfectly. As many of you already know I used to guide elk and mule deer hunts for Brush Mountain Ranch in Colorado. I am still very close with the owner and his family too this day. I had been kicking the idea around of getting some type of hunt together to do with my dad. I have not been on a hunting trip with my dad in probably 7 years or so.

I was talking with my buddy who is the owners son and we got talking about hunting season as hard as this may be to believe, and he told me they were not booking hunts for the second season and they were just doing a family hunt, which they invited me and my dad to join in on. It has been two years since I was in colorado and was itching to get back. As soon as I told my dad about the offer it was a done deal. The one down fall to this hunt for me was this hunt was a rifle hunt. I have not hunted with a center fire rifle in 9 years up to this year. But this did not bother me that much I figured its as good a time to get back in the swing of gun hunting as any.

I started preparing for this hunt mid summer by biking and hiking more frequently to help get into better shape. The next thing I did was glass bedded the action on my Ruger 7mm Mag. and free floated the barrel. WOW did this tighten up my accruancy from the bench. I went from about 1 in MOA down to .336 in MOA. After shooting all summer the time finally came to leave for the hunt. I think up to this point me and my dad had talked on the phone about 100,000 times about our hopes and dreams for Colorado.

I had to work midnights the night prior so when I got off work I made the hour drive to my dads house and waited for him to get home from work at noon. It made it nice with him being a dayshift worker and me being on a night schedule. He drove until 11p and I took over until 9A and before you knew it we were in Colorado making sure our guns were still sighted in.

It was better than Christmas the night prior to season, I was excited to be back on the hunt with my dad and wanted to see him kill a big cow. My dad had drew a cow tag while I was the proud owner of a bull tag. When morning finally came we were all in the lodge deciding were everyone would be hunting for the morning. It was quickly decided that since I was the youngest one in camp I would be making the long walk up pucker hill into three corners. Pucker hill is a nightmare! its about a mile long with a steady up hill grade. Pucker hill got its name from the loggers who logged the property back in the mid 90's. They came up witht he name pucker hill after 3 logs trucks rolled down the hill side and the rest is self explanitory.

I was glad that we were able to get out of camp early that day as I was not sure how this hike would be for my dad. Turned out he handled it supprisingly well. On the way into three corners I thought we were in a little trouble because I could already hear elk above us and it was pretty warm all night. When we finally made it to our destination I could hear a group of cows just below us on the mountain in the thick cover. I set my dad up in the spot I figured the elk were most likely to come up and I moved about 100 yards down the trial so I could cover a small field were elk also frequent.

After listening to the cows mew and chirp for a little bit I finally heard the bone chilling bugle of a bull. I knew the elk were more than likely only 150 to 200 yards in front of my but they kept moving north and south but were not coming up the mountian. After about 40 minutes I could tell the elk had moved from in front of me to back in front of my dad. I could tell they were all getting ready to move and come up the mountain because the cows were being very vocal. I then started to sneak but up towards my dads location. As soon as I seen my dad I was pumped he was already taking aim on the heard of elk. I was not sure if my dad would shoot without me being up near him because he had been telling me the whole trip he didnt care if he shot an elk but he wanted me to shoot one. Its kind of funny but that it the same thing I was telling him.

As I crept up the trail I then got into position were I could see the elk. There were wbout 20 cows in front of my dad, and all the sudden BANG! he shot and just as quick as he shot the cows all hearded up. I ran over to my dad telling him to shoot his cow again since I did not see one drop. My dad then looked at me with big eyes and said he was not sure which one he had shot at since it was just a cluster of cows standing in front of us. As I tried to find a cow in the group that looked hit my father made a wise choice and did not shoot again as he did not want to run the chance of having 2 cows down.

All the sudden another group of cows started coming up the hill side and I heard my dad say bull SHOOT HIM! I quickly shouldered my gun only yo see a small rag horn running up the sid eof the mountian. I did not even pay much attention to whether this was a legal bull or not I just knew it was not what I was looking for. As the second group of cows passed the first group of 20 followed. I continued looking for a cow that may have been injured when I heard the bull bugling again. I knew the heard bull would more then likely be at the back of the heard to drive his herum up the mountian. As I turned to look were all the other elk had came up I could see the antlers.

The bull was moving up hill fast and was pushing a group of probably 5 cows. As the bull stepped into the open I began chirping and mewing trying to get him to stop with little luck. The bull did slow down to a half trot and I felt very confident in my shooting ability. I did not have time to range the elk but I knew he was in my kill zone for the 7mm.

I touched off a shot just prior to the bull getting into the cover. I was unsure on whether I had even hit the bull since he did not hunch or anything at the shot. The rest of the cows took off up the hill and out of sight. I told my dad I knew were they would be coming back up and we could try and cut them off and see it a cow was lagging behind. As we got to the area I seen an elk down in the bowl and I told my dad there she is. I thought this was the cow my dad had shot at but as I looked though my scope it was just in time to watch my bull drop.

I was very pumped my bull had only ran maybe a 100 yards down hill and piled up. I ended up and put a second round into him still because he had tried picking his head up and I was unsure of my first shot and this was the nail in the coffen. We then headed down to my elk and I actually lost my train of though and forgot my dad had even shot and was trying to catch up to me as i meandered down the mountian. After checking out my bull and catching my breath we then went to look for blood were the cow was standing that my dad shot at, we checked the area for about an hour but found nothing and it looked to be a clean miss.

We then turned our attention back to my elk and my buddy had just made his way over when he head the shooting and figured we might need help with animals. We took a couple pictures and by buddy left to go get the 6 wheeler while I gutted my elk. To my suprise the first shot I made on my elk was a perfect double lung shot and the second was a liver and backside lung since the elk was laying quarting hard away from me. We finally got my bull all loaded up and headed down off the mountian and I stopped and ranged my shot. 247 yards off hand on a moving elk, I really didnt think the shot was quiet that far but was very happy with the outcome.

I was a little bummed that my dad did not get his cow but at the same time was happy he had his tag so we could do some more hunting together with one focus on his cow.

That evening we got into another large heard of elk but they were just over the property line so they got the free pass. Boy did they put on a great show thou, the heard had a very nice heard bull with couple other decent bulls and probably 50 cows. Iam not sure if in my 2 years of guiding I had even seen as many elk as I did this year. The next 3 hunts went the same lots of elk but no shots they were always either across the property line or the cows stayed to bunched up and did not present a shot. Finally on the 3 morning my dad connected on a monster cow. I mean this thing looked like a clydesdale, it was noticablly larger then my bull.

We were supposed to leave on Thursday morning but they were calling for a big storm on wednesday. I told my dad we were going to hit the road so we could just take our time getting back and beat the storm. In camp was a couple other guys from Michigan and we dicided we would all leave together. This was a good choice because by the time we left we had about 8 inches of wet heavy snow. The trip through battle pass was a wicked one but we made it just in time. I heard later that they ened up closing the pass after we went through because of a car accident.

All in all this was a great hunt and it felt great to spend time in camp with my dad and some great friends. These are memories that will never be forgotten and can never be replaced. I hope to go on another trip with my dad sometime in the near future, you can never take these oppertunities for granted as you never know how many hunts any of us have left. I will send UPMAN some more pics and see if he can post them for me. I dont have many because we just used my dads camera and I havent been able to get back to his house since getting home to pick up a copy of them.


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