Up and Adam Adventures

Here's a great clip from Shane Mahoney's speech at the 2017 RMEF National Convention. If you are not familiar with his work, I highly recommend researching it. Born and raised in Newfoundland, Shane is a biologist and writer widely known internationally as a lecturer on environmental and resource conservation issues. A committed hunter and fisherman, Shane lectures widely in the United States and Canada on the future of hunting and sport fishing and the role hunters and anglers have played in conserving our wildlife legacy. He frequently addresses resource management agencies and professionals concerning their roles as conservation leaders in the 21st century and conducts workshops on this theme throughout North America. Also check out his recent interview with Adam Janke on the Beyond The Kill.FM podcast . It's a great listen and well worth your time.

If you've followed my blog for the last few years, you know that my elk hunting has been a struggle to say the least. I've been archery hunting elk for the last few years and have come up empty handed every year. Some years the hunting was tough, some years I made a lot of mistakes, some years I missed shots, but every year I ate my tag. This year I was able to break the streak. I moved back to Wyoming this year, but wasn't able to draw a tag of any kind. Not wanting to sit out the whole season, I decided to buy an over-the-counter elk tag in Utah. Having never hunted Utah, and with only a couple days to scout, my first days in the field were spent "bowhiking." The bulls weren't bugling at all, so I resorted to looking for sign and trying to find an active wallow. I lucked up and found a couple of wallows a few miles apart that were being hit pretty regularly. I set a trail camera on one of the wallows and got some pics of several smaller bulls, a...

Although I wasn't able to connect with an elk this year, I did accomplish one goal on my trip to Wyoming, and that was taking my first archery coyote. Well, two of them actually.   I was set up watching a wallow one afternoon when 6 coyotes came right through the clearing. Being an equal opportunity kind of guy, I flung a few arrows and was able to put down two of these fawn killers before the pack got nervous and moved on. They never saw or smelled me.  This was also the first blood for the Diamond Infinite Edge Pro that I'll be posting a review of soon.  I also took an afternoon off to do a little trout fishing. Although I didn't catch much, it was good to shift focus a little bit and recharge for the rest of the hunt. 

As I rode back to my parents' house with my dad after another unsuccessful elk hunt a few weeks ago, we began to wax philosophical about the wapiti and the pursuit thereof.  "It gets in your blood," he said about hearing your first bugle. I don't think there's any phrase that so perfectly and succinctly describes what happens the first time you hear that throaty, growling, then ascending squeal echoing from a distant ridge or meadow at daybreak. The only other moment that can come close is the first time you hear a turkey gobble on a cool morning before he flies down off the roost.  When I first heard an elk bugle, I wasn't serious about hunting. I hunted, but it was more about spending time with my dad than the actual hunting part. "If I had my 'druthers'" as he would say, I would have chosen fishing over hunting. In fact, the last couple of years I lived in Wyoming, I barely hunted because my bass boat kept calling me to t...

As I write this, I'm preparing to head to elk camp in the Bridger National Forest in Wyoming with my dad. I was here about 2 weeks ago doing some scouting as this would be the first time I've hunted this area. My hopes are high because Wyoming elk have kicked my butt the last few years and I'm ready to turn the tables on them! While scouting I did find some sign, but my main goal was to break down some general areas that I could really work over  once I was back here to hunt. This is the first weekend of the season so I'm expecting some company on the trails, but hopefully the somewhat difficult access and lack of roads will keep the crowds away, or at least concentrate them on the roads. I'm not what I would consider a lucky hunter, so I've become accustomed to covering ground and working hard. Usually to no avail, but not for lack of effort. Hopefully I'll be posting a success story in a week or less and have something to show for all ...

For the past few years I've been hunting the same area in Wyoming with an Area 67-68-69 Type 9 archery elk tag, usually purchased in the leftover sales. Although I've gotten closer each year, I haven't been able to seal the deal on a bull. But because of the remoteness and amount of wilderness in the area, there are always leftover tags and I felt sure I would be able to keep coming back to this area until I got it done. This past season, a world record elk was killed nearby with a crossbow on a General tag. Although that's great news for hunters and speaks to the genetics of elk in the area, suddenly this area is so popular that there were no tags leftover this year. Suspecting this might be the case, I applied for the tag through the draw system back in January but was unsuccessful. Not wanting to sit the elk season out, I jumped on an area 97 tag that was available.  So this year instead of hunting an area I'm very familiar with, I'll be sta...

I had just got out of the truck and started to get my gear together when I heard the bugle of a bull elk on the ridge behind me.  "He's right there!" I whispered to my dad as I hurriedly threw on my pack and grabbed my bow. It wasn't quite daylight yet so I used the cover of darkness to work my way up the hill to try and get into position, cow-calling as I went. As day started to break and I approached the clearing where I was sure the bull was, he was nowhere to be found. My gut instinct told me he was working his way down the ridge, so I took off through the timber, still cow-calling and hoping for a response.  I came to another clearing, and heard him bugle just on the other side of it. I scrambled to find some cover to set up in, and had no sooner got settled when he came out of the timber headed straight toward me, bugling like crazy. At about 60 yards away, he turned and began walking parallel to the timber patch I was in the edge of. He had been ex...

We had a plan. The plan was to go back to the exact spot I had several close calls with good bulls last year. This year I knew the pattern. I knew the location. All I had to do was hike up the mountain and stick an arrow in a bull. As my dad and I were driving toward Dubois, WY on Saturday evening, we began to smell smoke. The closer we got, we began to see smoke a ways off the highway to the north. Knowing the smoke was in the general direction of my hunting area gave me an uneasy feeling as we neared the turnoff to Horse Creek. Sure enough, as it began to get dark and we drove farther, you could see the orange glow of a raging fire in the sky. A forest ranger stopped us to inform us that the road was being closed. The fire had started the day before and grown from 4 acres to 400 in no time. It wasn't burning in the area I intended to hunt, but was closing in on the road, and homes and ranches in the area. Evacuations were in progress. So with some disbelief that a f...