This year I wanted to get an elk hunt in with Casey from Hushin, so I bought us two private land tags in Colorado. Rifle season during the rut on 8,000 acres. I figured it would be a shoo-in.
It wasn't.
That 8,000 acres turned out to be open prairie, antelope country. The elk were a migratory herd of about 200 head that mostly worked the borders of the property and rarely stepped onto it. Day one they were on us. After that they moved off, and we spent the rest of the week watching 200 elk bugling and rutting 300 to 500 yards past the fence on the neighbor's ground. After five days and passing three smaller bulls, I called it. Casey stayed two more days and got it done on a solid 300-inch 6x6.
Round Two
I had the property through January 31st, so I went back this week for five more days. This time I left the lever action at home (I'd brought it the first time thinking it would be close-range rut hunting) and brought my custom Viking Armament 300 PRC shooting 212 grain ELD-X.
I also brought Yolanda, my first employee, along with her husband. When I hired her four years ago she was a non-hunter from Colorado. This year she came to me and said she wanted to learn to hunt. I bought her a cow tag and we went after her first animal ever. She was shooting my son's 6.5 Creedmoor with 143 grain ELD-X.
Same story as last time: we roll in and the whole herd is on the neighbor's side. We got Yolanda on a cow at 250 yards and she missed. She'd practiced plenty, but the jitters got her and she jerked the trigger like every new hunter does at some point. That same day we laid in a field 500 yards from the herd watching them run around. All they had to do was move 300 yards north. They didn't.
Next morning we glassed them up off property, and even though we were a mile away, they saw the truck and bolted. My guess is the outfitters next door are pushing them with side-by-sides and trucks, because these elk are spooky. On prairie where you can see for miles, a truck is all it takes.
My Bull
Around noon I spotted the herd two miles out, right on the line between us and the neighbor, and decided to make a play. About a mile and a half stalk. We got pinned down 500 yards from three bulls with the rest of the herd 300 to 400 yards behind them, and we laid in the grass for five hours.
When those bulls finally stood up and fed off, we made a quick run to get within 400 to 800 yards of the herd. About 90% of them were still on the neighbor's side. The herd bull, probably around 320, solid 6x6 with good mass, was only 5 feet onto our property at 670 yards. I know I can make that shot. I passed anyway. If he took a step or two after the hit, he's on the neighbor's ground, and those neighbors are not friendly to other hunters. Not worth it.
So I kept glassing and found another bull that looked like a 6x6 bedded under a tree about 200 yards inside our line, 570 yards out. I closed another 100 yards and shot him out of his bed at 470. Bam, flop. Two perfect shots with the 300 PRC, both in under 4 seconds. The suppressor keeps the recoil way down. It's all on camera, you'll see it in the film.
Not the biggest bull ant 6x5 and not the one I came for, but given how hard this hunt was, I'll take it all day.
Yolanda's First Elk
When I shot, the whole herd blew onto our property and ran to the far southwest corner. Next morning we started on the north end like always, glassed, came up empty, then found the herd 3 miles away on the far end.
We drove as close as we could without blowing them out, about a mile and a half as the crow flies, then hiked roughly 3 miles. Got within 100 yards of four bulls, no cows, so no shot. Then we saw the herd moving east to west along the fence line, about 100 yards on our side.
We ran up the hill and belly crawled about 100 yards to look into the canyon where they should have been. Nothing. I've got Yolanda prone on the RP bipod and I'm thinking, how do you lose 200 elk?
I look left at a little knob and there's a bull staring right at me. They were right there. That bull stands up and 200 elk come pouring out at 200 yards, on our property. Yolanda's asking which one. I tell her to pick one with nothing behind it. I'm cow calling hard to stop them, and they wouldn't have stopped without it. The herd stops, she finds her cow, and 10-rings her. First animal ever.
It was incredible to watch. She already wants to keep hunting. I'm blessed to have this job and blessed to have had Yolanda out there with us.
Takeaways
This was my first time hunting private land like this. I expected to kill on day one. Couldn't have been more wrong. This was a grind, tons of miles every day, and open grassland is brutal. Would I do it again? Probably not on this property. But it always feels great to get it done.
All in, about 12 days invested including travel, 9 of them hunting. What an opportunity.
We've got two films coming out later this fall, plus a Hushin film. Three films out of this whole ordeal. Stay tuned.
It wasn't.
That 8,000 acres turned out to be open prairie, antelope country. The elk were a migratory herd of about 200 head that mostly worked the borders of the property and rarely stepped onto it. Day one they were on us. After that they moved off, and we spent the rest of the week watching 200 elk bugling and rutting 300 to 500 yards past the fence on the neighbor's ground. After five days and passing three smaller bulls, I called it. Casey stayed two more days and got it done on a solid 300-inch 6x6.
Round Two
I had the property through January 31st, so I went back this week for five more days. This time I left the lever action at home (I'd brought it the first time thinking it would be close-range rut hunting) and brought my custom Viking Armament 300 PRC shooting 212 grain ELD-X.
I also brought Yolanda, my first employee, along with her husband. When I hired her four years ago she was a non-hunter from Colorado. This year she came to me and said she wanted to learn to hunt. I bought her a cow tag and we went after her first animal ever. She was shooting my son's 6.5 Creedmoor with 143 grain ELD-X.
Same story as last time: we roll in and the whole herd is on the neighbor's side. We got Yolanda on a cow at 250 yards and she missed. She'd practiced plenty, but the jitters got her and she jerked the trigger like every new hunter does at some point. That same day we laid in a field 500 yards from the herd watching them run around. All they had to do was move 300 yards north. They didn't.
Next morning we glassed them up off property, and even though we were a mile away, they saw the truck and bolted. My guess is the outfitters next door are pushing them with side-by-sides and trucks, because these elk are spooky. On prairie where you can see for miles, a truck is all it takes.
My Bull
Around noon I spotted the herd two miles out, right on the line between us and the neighbor, and decided to make a play. About a mile and a half stalk. We got pinned down 500 yards from three bulls with the rest of the herd 300 to 400 yards behind them, and we laid in the grass for five hours.
When those bulls finally stood up and fed off, we made a quick run to get within 400 to 800 yards of the herd. About 90% of them were still on the neighbor's side. The herd bull, probably around 320, solid 6x6 with good mass, was only 5 feet onto our property at 670 yards. I know I can make that shot. I passed anyway. If he took a step or two after the hit, he's on the neighbor's ground, and those neighbors are not friendly to other hunters. Not worth it.
So I kept glassing and found another bull that looked like a 6x6 bedded under a tree about 200 yards inside our line, 570 yards out. I closed another 100 yards and shot him out of his bed at 470. Bam, flop. Two perfect shots with the 300 PRC, both in under 4 seconds. The suppressor keeps the recoil way down. It's all on camera, you'll see it in the film.
Not the biggest bull ant 6x5 and not the one I came for, but given how hard this hunt was, I'll take it all day.
Yolanda's First Elk
When I shot, the whole herd blew onto our property and ran to the far southwest corner. Next morning we started on the north end like always, glassed, came up empty, then found the herd 3 miles away on the far end.
We drove as close as we could without blowing them out, about a mile and a half as the crow flies, then hiked roughly 3 miles. Got within 100 yards of four bulls, no cows, so no shot. Then we saw the herd moving east to west along the fence line, about 100 yards on our side.
We ran up the hill and belly crawled about 100 yards to look into the canyon where they should have been. Nothing. I've got Yolanda prone on the RP bipod and I'm thinking, how do you lose 200 elk?
I look left at a little knob and there's a bull staring right at me. They were right there. That bull stands up and 200 elk come pouring out at 200 yards, on our property. Yolanda's asking which one. I tell her to pick one with nothing behind it. I'm cow calling hard to stop them, and they wouldn't have stopped without it. The herd stops, she finds her cow, and 10-rings her. First animal ever.
It was incredible to watch. She already wants to keep hunting. I'm blessed to have this job and blessed to have had Yolanda out there with us.
Takeaways
This was my first time hunting private land like this. I expected to kill on day one. Couldn't have been more wrong. This was a grind, tons of miles every day, and open grassland is brutal. Would I do it again? Probably not on this property. But it always feels great to get it done.
All in, about 12 days invested including travel, 9 of them hunting. What an opportunity.
We've got two films coming out later this fall, plus a Hushin film. Three films out of this whole ordeal. Stay tuned.
