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t one time there were six sub-species of elk inhabiting North America: The Rocky Mountain Elk, Roosevelt's Elk, Tule Elk, Manitoba Elk, Merriam's Elk (extinct), and the Eastern Elk (extinct). Today there are only four. The Elk (Cervus Elaphus) range from Northern and Central Canada southward into Western Texas inhabiting some mid-western states West to California. The elk is the second largest member of the deer family and belong to a group of animals called ungulates. They are also herbivores meaning they eat only plants. Every Spring, the bull elk begin growing a new set of antlers from their pedicles. The antlers begin as layers of cartilage but soon turn into bone. A soft covering of velvet helps protect the antlers while they are forming and carries blood to the growing bone. The elk is well equipped to survive in a world full of predators and harsh conditions. The elk has multi-chambered stomachs so it can digest roughage, a keen sense of smell, large eyes that can detect even the slightest of movement and big ears that can twist forward to detect even the faintest of sounds. Elk also have unbelievable stamina and muscular bodies that allow them to move easily in mountainous terrain. Elk are one of the most popular animals in North America. Although elk will probably never fully return to all of their historic ranges, there are now more wild elk in North America than there were 100 years ago. There are now approximately 700 elk in the state of Pennsylvania after being re-introduced to the state in the early 1900's. There are now elk sightings in areas that haven't seen elk in 50 years. The awesome elk is truly a success story in North America and the echoing bugle of a bull elk is still the real "Call Of The Wild". Elk hunting in North America is a favorite past time for hunters throughout the United States and Canada. Colorado elk hunting, Montana elk hunting, New Mexico elk hunting, Arizona elk hunting, Utah elk hunting, and Wyoming elk hunting are hunting opportunities that exist for the avid elk hunter in the lower 48. There are numerous elk hunting outfitters that specialize in trophy elk hunting for the hunter who is looking for a really big animal. Whether elk hunting in Colorado, or any where out west where the elk call home, the experience will be second to none.

Tips for Elk Hunting

Elk Sites

Instructional elk hunting stories should contain a large number of qualifiers, because elk are mobile and adaptable animals that occupy a wide range of territory stretching from timberline to desert valleys. However, all elk seek certain types of topography and vegetation to fulfill their needs. Hunters can narrow their search for elk by finding those habitats.

Security

Every study of elk on public land emphasizes the elk’s need for security. Even during the spring and summer, elk stay away from humans and especially humans and motorized vehicles. One study found elk stayed at least 400 yards from roads open to vehicles. During hunting season that buffer zone increased with some elk traveling over six miles back into the mountains during the first days of the hunting season to escape hunters. It’s no surprise then the study “Characteristics of Idaho Elk Hunters Relative to Road Access on Public Lands” concluded hunter success rates were lower in areas with a high concentration of open roads compared to terrain with closed roads or no roads.

Even places with closed roads may hold few elk because so many roads crisscross the country allowing easy access to hunters on foot. Extensive logging in these areas has also removed most concealing cover. Another Idaho study found elk require blocks of cover at least 250 acres in size and half a mile from any open road. A friend in Washington says he hikes right through logged areas on U.S. Forest Service and timber company land until he reaches wide stretches of uncut country. Those hikes might be four or more miles one way. This “sweat factor,” as he says, is the barrier elk seek to stay away from hunters.

Forage Under Cover

Old growth and mature timber provide elk with adequate cover and good protection from the weather. Yet by early fall, the plants beneath these trees have dried out and provide little palatable food for elk. In early fall, elk much prefer dense stands of spruce and poletimber, like lodgepole pine, on north- and east-facing slopes of ridges with a limited exposure to the drying sun. These thickets limit visibility, and the forbs and browse that grow beneath the heavy canopy remain green and moist late into the fall. Add a bog, spring or stream, and these places are elk heaven. Water’s importance cannot be overemphasized.

I always head to these places early in the fall. The air there holds the sweet scent of ferns and the chill of a trickle of water flowing among moss-covered rocks. Early one October patches of snow covered the ground of a north-facing slope of short spruce and tall lodgepoles. Just enough snow remained to show where elk had browsed among Oregon grape and the low shrubs of serviceberry.

Shortly after sunup I stopped for a rest and to eat a sandwich, because I’d already been hiking for nearly two hours. I continued on with my rifle riding in the crook of my arm, following game trails that merged one into another. The buckskin flank of an elk flashed between the trees ahead. Antlers came into view, but I was too slow to bring the rifle to bear in the second the fivepoint bull was in sight. More elk were coming along the same line. My rifle was up when a cow followed by another cow and a calf crossed the gap in the trees. I saw the head of the last elk before it reached the open and fired the moment the spike stepped into the clear.

Running across those elk in that thicket was luck. Still the odds were at least fair because I was hunting where elk lived at that time of the year.

By late October or so, mature bulls have drifted away from the bunches and herds of cows and calves. The bulls go off by themselves or in groups of three or four. A favorite place for these bulls is the head of a drainage far back in the mountains. They stay there in a small area as long as the food and water hold out and no hunters bother them. However, bulls also hole-up in pockets in the foothills or even valleys where a river or canyon makes access difficult for hunters.

The biggest bull I ever shot was bedded with three other bulls on top of a steep rock face across a river from a paved highway. I climbed through a saddle in the hill and into a bowl between two ridges grown up in Christmas-tree-sized Douglas firs. Old and new tracks from elk that had been living there for weeks crisscrossed the couple of inches of snow. I tried following a fresh set but lost it in the jumble of tracks.

A game trail led along the crest of a finger ridge. Across a swale a bull stood up from its bed in the deadfall and short firs. It had seen my movement but not heard or smelled anything to confirm its suspicion. I found the yellow hide behind its shoulder through the scope. The elk turned its head and a sweep of antlers followed. The scope’s crosshairs wavered then settled on the chest of the bull. At the shot the bull fell back into its bed. Three more bulls jumped from their beds as I hurried across to the dead bull. A five-point ran past within 10 yards, its eyes bulging in terror.

I have jumped elk out of that hideaway two times since. Then again I have hunted it a dozen times without seeing so much as a track.

Forage in the Open

With the hard freezes and then snows of late fall, elk switch to grasses and browse. Enough snow forces elk to lower elevations and into the open of west- and southfacing slopes to graze on grasses like bluebunch wheatgrass, bluejoint and Idaho fescue. That is if they feel safe.

I sat at the top of a mile-long park of grass one morning looking with my binocular at parks across the mountains for elk and elk tracks against the new snow. Nothing showed after an hour, so I moved on up the mountain. The tracks of a half-dozen elk ran right inside the timber. The tracks stayed beneath the timber and showed where the elk had stopped to chew off the wirelike leaves of bear grass. Bear grass is poor forage, especially compared to the bunch grasses that were a short distance away in the open, but the elk skirted every opening as they climbed up the mountain and over the top.

Heavy fog or falling snow provide elk with an illusion of safety that is often enough to entice them into the open. Forget the advice of hunting right after a snow storm. Elk are out and feeding during a storm. One weekend fog hung over the mountains during my youngest son’s first hunting season. Fresh tracks ran back and forth, even over our tracks (okay, I got turned around a few times). We hunted the whole morning around parks and through sparse timber, but visibility was limited to about 50 yards, and we never did see an elk. California can be a great place to hunt elk in. See our California Elk Hunting page for more tips and information to sucessful elk hunting.

Approaching Elk

Keeping the wind in your favor is the most elementary lesson of elk hunting. That’s difficult to accomplish among the swirling winds in the timber. Still, the wind usually blows in a definite direction and down-slope during the first and last of the day and up-slope during the day. For instance, hunting a northfacing slope is fruitless while walking along a ridge top with the wind blowing your scent downhill. About all you can do is move along the opposite side of the ridge, coming back to the ridge crest ever so often to peek over for a look. This is difficult, but elk hunting is hard work. An easier approach is to hunt along the ridge face at the same elevation or slightly below where elk might be feeding, but elk can see you much easier when you’re below them.

An elevation advantage is even more important when hunting elk in the open. Hunting up-slope does no good because elk can see you coming for a long way when you’re below them. Plus, nobody can climb uphill fast enough to catch an elk as it meanders uphill on the way to its bed. And elk nearly always go uphill to bed for the day.

During the night and until shortly after sunup, the night’s cold air flows down-slope. This gives a hunter enough time to hike from one side or the other and come out above where elk are feeding in the open at first light. As the elk move up the mountain, a hunter can see them coming and, if need be, move across the slope quickly enough to intercept them.

There’s a mile-long, south-facing ridge where I’ve shot a couple of elk as they grazed on the bunch grass during winter storms. The elk stay to the upper end of the park and by dawn start moving up into the timber.

To reach the head of the park requires a hike that starts most of two hours before daylight. The route goes up one ridge to the east of the park then across to the head of the park. I stand just off the crest of the ridge and peek over the top. Most often tracks of elk that fed during the night are all that remain. Ever so often, though, elk are there. One morning I had just peeked over and saw six elk trotting up the hill. The second and last in line were bulls, and I pulled the 7mm off my shoulder. They came into range, and a single bullet knocked the first bull out of line.

The time to move on elk is when they are feeding. Once they head for bed, they can pick any one of a hundred places to lay up to chew their cud for the day, with all their senses on the defensive.

A few years ago my brother-in-law Neil drew one of the few elk tags for the Missouri River Breaks. The country lay open with grass and sagebrush benches cut with deep coulees of Douglas fir. The first morning we spotted a six-point bull grazing at the edge of a bench a couple of miles to the north. Neil thought we should wait until the bull went to its bed for the day before beginning a stalk. Right at sunup the bull walked into a coulee about 500 yards long and 200 yards wide. Neil entered the timber from downwind, while I sat on a knob with a good view of all sides of the draw.

After a couple of hours, Neil came out of the draw at the opposite end. Through my binocular I saw him raise his empty hands in a question of, “Well?”

I raised my hands back, “Nothing.”

Neil hunted back through the length of the coulee, then gave up.

That elk never left that timbered draw. I had a good view of all sides of it and would have seen it if it had. What the elk had done was hug the ground like a whitetail buck. Neil would have had to nearly step on the bull for it to leave its bed.

In the last light that evening, we spotted three other bulls come out of another coulee onto a grass flat. Neil decided we should stand on the downwind side of that flat at the first hint of light the following morning. We were, and saw a full set of antlers floating toward us above the curve in the ground. The bull stepped into view and Neil shot it.

Heavily hunted elk may only feed under the cover of darkness. By the time shooting light has arrived, the elk are already tucked into their beds for the day. The only solution is to track them. Elk commonly travel one, three or more miles from where they feed to where they bed. So bring a lunch, because it takes all day.

Once I cut a bull track in the snow at the edge of a park where the elk had fed during the night. The track headed into the timber and up the mountain. After a couple of miles, the track finally started to wander, indicating the bull was looking for a bed. I slowed my pace and knelt every few yards to look ahead through the open between the ground and the lowest branches on the trees. For no reason the tracks turned down the hill. I thought I had spooked the elk and took off on the tracks. However, the elk had only made a loop that brought it back up the hill and above its tracks to bed. I came trudging up over a short rise and saw the bull’s bed. It was empty, because the bull had seen me following its tracks below.

I knelt in the bull’s bed and looked around. The bed lay on the crest of a finger ridge where the elk could watch over both edges and below without exposing itself. The breeze came mainly from below, but also swirled somewhat so the elk smelled what was on the wind from nearly all directions. A wall of deadfall covered its back. Still, a quiet hunter could approach the elk from above.

A few years later the lesson was put to the test. A single track came out of a creek bottom, straight up the hill and over the ridge top. A quarter of the way down the far side, the elk slowed its pace. It turned parallel to the ridge to keep its elevation. When the track turned sharply downhill, I resisted all temptation to follow. Instead I climbed up the hill a ways then continued in the original direction. Within 100 yards I came to a thicket of short spruce crisscrossed with waist-high deadfall. The elk was down in there, somewhere.

I sat on each deadfall I couldn’t step over and swiveled my rear to swing my legs over. Through a lane in the trees lay a cow elk in its bed with its head nodding in sleep. I had a cow tag, so any elk was legal. Bird in the hand and all that – I shot. The cow jumped up, then went down kicking. The whole place erupted in a racket of fleeing elk. Looking for the easiest route to carry out the meat, I found the tracks where a half-dozen elk had entered the thicket from the opposite side. The one elk had simply joined them.

Luck was with me hunting through that thicket. However, I knew where the elk lived, and that knowledge was enough to qualify me to eat broiled elk steak that winter. If you liked this article, also see our Idaho Elk Hunting page for more information on hunting elk.

By John Haviland

This article and many more like it can be found by Successful Hunter Magazine. Visit them at www.successfulhunter.com