5 Key Lessons from This Year’s Elk Hunt

In today's post, I want to share the five key lessons we learned during this year’s elk hunt in late September. If you're an elk hunter or thinking about trying it out, these key takeaways will definitely help you on next seasons hunt.

Lesson 1: Separate the Shooter from the Caller

A crucial lesson we learned the hard way is the importance of separating the shooter from the caller. Despite knowing this or at least hearing this tactic going in, we still ended up setting up too close to each other. Typically when we setup, the shooter and the caller/cameraman are just 5 to 10 yards apart. The main reason behind this for us is to be able to video the shot. This mistake cost us multiple shot opportunities this season. It became clear to us that the elk were smart enough to locate the exact location of the call and expect a cow to be right there. Each time a bull showed up, he surveyed the area where the call was coming from and when he didn’t lay eyes on the cow, he got the heck out of there. On heavily pressured public land these bulls are quick to become uncomfortable and you can’t get away with much trickery. If we had a muzzleloader in hand, we still would’ve been able to squeeze two or three shots off but with a bow there was just too much in between.

On the last couple of days, we finally spread out more, with shooters 30 to 40 yards apart and the caller even farther behind. This setup worked much better and had we done this sooner we likely would have been able to ambush one of these bulls with a bow in hand.

Lesson 1 Diagram - The figure to the left is how we setup vs. the figure to the right on how we should've been setting up each time.

Lesson 2: Don’t Assume You Can Tell the Difference Between a Hunter and an Elk

Don’t trust every bugle or cow call you hear. Sometimes what you think is another hunter is actually a real bull, and vice versa. We had an instance where we were convinced we heard other hunters calling only to later find big bull tracks exactly where we thought they were. This bugling happened 5 to 6 times in a period of 2 minutes and sounded like a bugle tube with absolutely no guttural noises. We put our bows down, walked out into the meadow in front of us and waited on the other public land hunters to come talk to us. It’s better to check out every sound rather than assume it’s not worth investigating.

Lesson 3: Pay Attention to Tracks and THE Direction They’re Headed

This year, a fresh rain on the first day gave us prime conditions to follow tracks and pickup hints on where bulls were located. Unfortunately, we didn’t capitalize on this early enough. After crossing over some fresh bull tracks while fetching water, we set up camp nearby but didn’t fully appreciate the significance of those nearby tracks or the direction they were headed. Sure enough, a big bull showed up 300 yards from camp later that evening, exactly where those tracks led. By the time we located the bull, it was too late in the evening to make a move on him. If we had focused in on those tracks earlier in the day, we could’ve located that bull upon his first bugle.

It’s pretty obvious that paying closer attention to tracks can help you predict where elk are heading and potentially lead to a successful setup, but it’s also something that can be overlooked in significance.

Lesson 4: Smaller Tents Are Better in Rough Terrain

If the weather allows, stick with smaller one or two person tents, even if you have a larger group. If you are going to need a stove to warm the tent, then by all means go with the larger setup. We used a teepee style (the Argali Absoroka) four-person tent this year to save weight, but it made setting up camp much harder. Finding a large, flat area free of rocks or cactus was a challenge in the mountainous terrain and we realized that our smaller one person tents would have been much more practical. Finding a couple suitable spots for a one person tent is a lot easier than finding one big spot for the 4 person setup.

The Argali Absaroka 4P Tent 

Lesson 5: Bic Lighters Suck—Bring Good Matches and Check Your Water Filter Before heading in.

When it comes to starting campfires, Bic lighters are not the best option, especially in windy conditions. They make it difficult to maneuver into the fire's tender without burning your thumb or having the flame knocked around by the wind. Instead of trusting in the cigarette starting lighters, invest in good long burning matches. Take a look at the burn time or the size of the burn tip to find a good match.

Lastly, make sure you replace your water filter before heading out. A faulty filter can ruin your trip, and trust me, you don’t want to deal with that in the backcountry or the weeks after the trip. Our filters did their job (knock on wood) but were much slower this season than last. I’m going to buy a replacement filter every year unless I can get the old one clean enough to filter water a efficient rate.

All in all, we spent a great six days hunting during the late September archery season in Colorado, right at the end of muzzleloader season. Although we had several encounters early in the week, the rut action tapered off as the week progressed. Some of these lessons were things we should have known from previous trips, but it often takes making mistakes to really learn them.

Hopefully, these insights help you avoid the same pitfalls. If you want more details, we’ve got a podcast episode covering the entire trip and the full hunt video will be out soon.

Feel free to subscribe, leave a comment, or share your own lessons from this season! Let’s help each other get better out there.