Elk Hunting Success “Pearls”

[WapitiTalk1]

Yes, there’s a LOT more to successful elk hunting than one tip or trick, much..much more. But, if you were to share a single “pearl” with a newer elk hunter to help them down the path, what would it be? Let’s here em’

[Elkhunttoo]

Rifle- find good vantage points and glass a lot. Be patient, yet if there are no elk in the area, move.

Archery- don’t be afraid to sit a tree stand or a blind. Calling is a ton of fun but the success rates are hard to argue.

[7mmfan]

Most of my experience is rifle hunting. The most i.portant lesson I've learned is if you see them, go after them. Sitting and watching and waiting rarely results in dead elk
To many times paralysis by analysis has resulted in unfilled tags. Ser them, make a plan, go get them. If it doesn't work out, learn from it and try again.

[Lefty]

Most of my experience is rifle hunting. The most i.portant lesson I've learned is if you see them, go after them. Sitting and watching and waiting rarely results in dead elk
To many times paralysis by analysis has resulted in unfilled tags. Ser them, make a plan, go get them. If it doesn't work out, learn from it and try again.

Great one!!


For some: success doesn't always need to be measured in inches on the wall, meat in the freezer or punched tag.

[Swede]

Learn all you can from every credible source you find.
Regardless of how you pursue elk, persist and be patient.

[Swede]

For some: success doesn't always need to be measured in inches on the wall, meat in the freezer or punched tag.

Please tell me who are these "some" you refer to that would spend $1,000 for a license, tags, preference points and elk hunting equipment who come back home empty handed and say they were successful? I will give a pass to anyone that goes out and helps someone else bag their elk. You get to share in that success.
The empty handed hunter may be educated and may have had a great time out, but if the quarry is elk, and you spend the kind of money it takes to hunt them, please don't call empty game bags a sign of success.
Swede's pearl of elk wisdom is to stay here on the forum and learn the tricks of elk hunters, from those who know real success, so you too can return home with full game bags on ice.

[Trumkin the Dwarf]

If the elk turds taste like dirt, the sign is too old. Go find the good stuff that still tastes like chocolate, that's where you're gonna find the herd.

[WapitiTalk1]

If the elk turds taste like dirt, the sign is too old. Go find the good stuff that still tastes like chocolate, that's where you're gonna find the herd.

[2Rivers]

Hunt where the elk are, or keep moving until you find them.

[Elkhunttoo]

If the elk turds taste like dirt, the sign is too old. Go find the good stuff that still tastes like chocolate, that's where you're gonna find the herd.

I hope you mean milk duds

[Elkhunttoo]

For some: success doesn't always need to be measured in inches on the wall, meat in the freezer or punched tag.

Please tell me who are these "some" you refer to that would spend $1,000 for a license, tags, preference points and elk hunting equipment who come back home empty handed and say they were successful? I will give a pass to anyone that goes out and helps someone else bag their elk. You get to share in that success.
The empty handed hunter may be educated and may have had a great time out, but if the quarry is elk, and you spend the kind of money it takes to hunt them, please don't call empty game bags a sign of success.
Swede's pearl of elk wisdom is to stay here on the forum and learn the tricks of elk hunters, from those who know real success, so you too can return home with full game bags on ice.

I totally get that a punched tag is a successful hunt. And it’s expensive to not punch the tag. Yet over the years I have changed my opinion some.

When I look back over the years I think I hunt for the memories and the chase. I have spent the last few years archery hunting with my wife and we have shared highs and lows that most couples don’t get to share in the mountains or in life. I never thought my wife would be packing a bow along side of me several years ago. I’ve watched her on opening day pass up a calf at 20 yards and then on the last day of her hunt have a cow walk 5 yards past us and get it all on video. Shooting that cow never crossed my wife’s mind. She wants to get a good bull and we have came super close with her. Honestly some of my best and most memorable experience have been the close calls. I’ve killed several elk and hope to take several more but I really enjoy “the hunt” ...friends, family, alone, the camp, the food, and the chase. Some years my most disappointing time of the hunt is when I get one and know that it’s all over. Kinda always becomes a bitter sweet moment. As I’m working the animal up I’m usually already planning what the next year will bring. I’ve passed up several animals and in some ways I feel it has made me enjoy the hunt even more. Everyone is different and maybe this is just for me.

We also aren’t paying for non resident tags witch makes a difference.

[Elkslayer]

What I am about to say is not to brag but to give you an idea of my experience. I have harvested 22 elk with my bow two of which are bulls a spike a 6x7 nothing very big. The biggest mistake I make is not having a game plan. I have filled all my tags but one, last year. I got out of my truck and I could hear horns clashing like crazy about 200 yards away. I got about a hundred yards and watched with my bios. there were about 7 bulls, 4 were fighting hard and all were glunking. It was so amazing I couldn't believe what I was seeing. Then all of a sudden the heard bull chased all the cows strait at me. I panicked, 20 cows 20 and 30 yards away. witch one do I shoot? I made 3 shots and missed every one. one last bull came walking in front of me with his nose to the ground like a hound dog on a hot trail. I had a cow tag of course. I was shaking so bad I couldn't hold my hands legs or any part of my body still. I looked down at my knees and the were shaking like crazy. You would thing that I was shooting my very first elk.I had no game plan. I was watching the most spectacular fight of a life time. I lost count of how many times I watch elk with no game plan. This year is going to be different. I am going to trophy hunt the first week I want a 350 or better. I see elk that size every year even bigger. Some advice I got was to think of the saddest thing that has happened to me before I shoot . Does any one know if that works?

[Indian Summer]

One pearl? Ok... Hunt every day like it’s day 1 and that means get up early and be where you need to be before first light. Your whole day... and maybe your entire hunt could revolve around what you see or hear in the first few minutes of daylight. The challenge is to do that every single day of your hunt until it pays off.

[Lefty]

For some: success doesn't always need to be measured in inches on the wall, meat in the freezer or punched tag.

Please tell me who are these "some" you refer to that would spend $1,000 for a license, tags, preference points and elk hunting equipment who come back home empty handed and say they were successful? I will give a pass to anyone that goes out and helps someone else bag their elk. You get to share in that success.
The empty handed hunter may be educated and may have had a great time out, but if the quarry is elk, and you spend the kind of money it takes to hunt them, please don't call empty game bags a sign of success.
Swede's pearl of elk wisdom is to stay here on the forum and learn the tricks of elk hunters, from those who know real success, so you too can return home with full game bags on ice.

I totally get that a punched tag is a successful hunt. And it’s expensive to not punch the tag. Yet over the years I have changed my opinion some.
When I look back over the years I think I hunt for the memories and the chase. I have spent the last few years archery hunting with my wife and we have shared highs and lows that most couples don’t get to share in the mountains or in life. I never thought my wife would be packing a bow along side of me several years ago. I’ve watched her on opening day pass up a calf at 20 yards and then on the last day of her hunt have a cow walk 5 yards past us and get it all on video. Shooting that cow never crossed my wife’s mind. She wants to get a good bull and we have came super close with her. Honestly some of my best and most memorable experience have been the close calls. I’ve killed several elk and hope to take several more but I really enjoy “the hunt” ...friends, family, alone, the camp, the food, and the chase. Some years my most disappointing time of the hunt is when I get one and know that it’s all over. Kinda always becomes a bitter sweet moment. As I’m working the animal up I’m usually already planning what the next year will bring. I’ve passed up several animals and in some ways I feel it has made me enjoy the hunt even more. Everyone is different and maybe this is just for me.
We also aren’t paying for non resident tags witch makes a difference.

Swede when I was 13. the Minnesota deer season was closed. My dad and I went wit three others went to Saskatchewan. The one fellow was 54 at that time and spent most of his time in camp. He had three nr tags , and filled one. less than 100 yards from camp for camp meat. He maybe had the best time on that hunt. I was the only kid in school to get a deer that year, My dad and other two hunted each got a book whitetail.
Do I we want to get an elk, yep!!. A big elk, yepper!

Swede I have lots of friends and acquaintances that do things without the end results that many think they should have.
Joe M Spends hundred of hours to catch big Minnesota River catfish,.. just to let them go
Andrew bought a jet boat, has thousands into fishing gear just to take a picture and release a 6 or 7 or 8 foot sturgeon.
Indian Summer Joe rides a bike across the country , to get cold or get bugs in his teeth?
Friends go to hunt SD to shoot pheasant, When you could just knock on a few door in SE idaho
A neighbor grows giant pumpkins
RJ has a Red Chevrolet product, that mostly looks pretty sitting in the shed

And I never watch TV football

Back to the pearls of Success

[Tigger]

one pearl eh? How about socks. Wear good merino wool socks on your elk hunt. Don't wear cotton. You can thank me now or later; your choice.

[Swede]

Thanks Lefty for your explanation. I joke around more than about anyone here, but when I am giving pointers to help a person get an elk I have the mindset that I want them to be successful. I genuinely want to see the people that come to this site to find pearls of wisdom that can help them fill their tag. I will tell them about anything I know except where I have placed my tree stand. I will certainly help them find their own quality tree stand location that is every bit as good as the one where I sit.
To me a "pearl" for elk hunting success is not to say you can hunt like a rock star without getting an elk. You may enjoy your hunt and go home blessed to have been out, but that is not the essence of success in my book.
I knew two guys that went elk hunting and came back with gonorrhea. They claimed they had a great time, but they had no elk. I don't care what they had to say for their elk hunting experience, they were not successful elk hunters. Period!

[7mmfan]

Thanks Lefty for your explanation. I joke around more than about anyone here, but when I am giving pointers to help a person get an elk I have the mindset that I want them to be successful. I genuinely want to see the people that come to this site to find pearls of wisdom that can help them fill their tag. I will tell them about anything I know except where I have placed my tree stand. I will certainly help them find their own quality tree stand location that is every bit as good as the one where I sit.
To me a "pearl" for elk hunting success is not to say you can hunt like a rock star without getting an elk. You may enjoy your hunt and go home blessed to have been out, but that is not the essence of success in my book.
I knew two guys that went elk hunting and came back with gonorrhea. They claimed they had a great time, but they had no elk. I don't care what they had to say for their elk hunting experience, they were not successful elk hunters. Period!

Well their first mistake was not bringing penicillin with them on an elk hunt! There's a pearl of advice for you young guns.

[Swede]

The funniest part was the younger married man got home and gave the gonorrhea to his wife. The father was divorced at the time. I think they shared the same woman during the hunt.
Soon the married son took his wife to the doctor and tried to convince him to say it was an immunization shot. I do not remember what the immunization was supposed to be for, but am glad I did not have to live in their house. I suspect there may have been a decisive chill in the air. Kinda like elk hunting weather, only indoors or in the dog house.