Eprevost_tec
Member
- Joined
- Jun 25, 2018
- Messages
- 60
Let me start off by saying I am not a photographer. I tend to be "in the moment" and always forget to take out the camera. So sorry for the lack fo photographs.
During the summer of 2017, I felt like there was something missing from my life. Call it an early mid life crisis. I was approaching 40, my kids were approaching their late teen years, I had a great job and was advancing in my career and we were in the best financial position we had ever been in. However I was also riding a desk 50+ hours a week, putting on weight and was facing high cholesterol, and loosing my sense of purpose.
I had hunted, fished and trapped my whole life. Being from Ontario Canad, I spent summers on lakes and falls in the bush. Yet everry year I was getting further and further away from those passions. As fat would have it during the summer of 2017, I found the first episodes of MeatEater, and then.....Mr. Randy Newburg. Funny what a few hours of Youtube will do to change your life. After a few weeks of binge watching episodes of western elk hunting, and hearing the constant messages of the glory of western public land hunting, I found my purpose and was reconnected to what was missing in my life.
I spent almost every waking moment from the summer of 2017 to March of 2019 researching, reading books, gleaming over maps and spending countless hours on GoHunt and OnX maps websites gathering every bit of knowledge about elk hunting in Montana I could. I also hit the gym. I lost 30 pouds and gained the fitness I had in my 20s. I was fully consumed with elk hunting and the dream of a Montana and Western hunting experience. I knew that comming from Ontario I had a huge learning curve ahead of me, and an immence physical challenge to overcome.
During those years and months leading up to the draw application deadline, I also learned and immense amount about most of the western states, the draw systems, preference and bonus points and the immense oppertunities that exist in the USA. In fact, I think everyone should take the oppertunity to appreciate what and incredilble wildlife and public land system you have, and the amazing job that your resource managers do. Here is Canada, we dont have half as many oppertunities, and wildlife managers are so disconnected from the resources they manage that year after year we are loosing both opportunities and resources to hunt.
All the research and work paid off. I was successfull in drawing a general big game combo tag for the 2019 season in Montana. With tag in hand, e-scouting plans from A to Z and all of the gear ready to go, I headed to Montana. After a two and half day drive I arrived in Big Timber ready to tackle some public land hunting. I had arrived 5 days before the opening of the season, and would have 6 days total after opener to close the deal. I had planned to have this many days before the season as contingency to ensure that I had enough time to check through all of my e-scouting plans and be setup ready for opening day. Thanks to those of this forum for a bunch of advice on my plans, it was very helpfull.
The country was much different thank it appeared on maps and satelite imagery. I was well aware that this would be the case, but living my whole life at around 800 feet, seeing what 6000 and 10000 looked like was a bit of shock. I knew several things from my research and planning. I needed to find sanctuary areas as we were in the post rut period and that those areas needed to be near good food and water. I also needed to get back off of trails and roads.
I spend 5 solid days getting my butt kicked, hiking thousands of feet of elevations and as many miles as I could cover in a day. I glassed from great ridges focusing on north facing slopes. While I saw some amazing wildlife during my travels including some incredible 5x5 mule deer, a great trophy bull moose tending a cow, bears, etc. I didnt see any elk sign the whole time scouting. In fact the only elk I did see was a huge herd that were right off of a road on a farm field at 3000 feed grazing away at mid day.
Feeling very discouraged and beat up, with only day or so before opening, I went to a local bar to drown my sorrows. I was able to get chatting to the bar tender and some local who were both extremely friendly, and were able to give me some great advice. Everyone told me the same thing, the elk arent down yet?? "Oh they will be down when we get the snows in the mountains, but they arent down yet". But this was contradictory to everything I learned. I just couldnt make heads or tails about their advice.
Opening morning of the season came, and so did the weather. The temps dropped, snow fell and the weather turned to SH***T. The forest service roads that I was using as jumping off points were now innacessible. I immidiately purchased a set of chains, but the next day the wind blew drift that were impassible. While I had camped in the back country during my scouting, I am very glad that I did not camp out during the first days of the season, as I would have been snowed in on those access roads. Surely with this weather the elk would start to move. I had a few days left and did what I could. However I was now restricted to trail heads at main roads and could not get back as far as I wanted. The temps made hiking harder and learning to hike cold was hard for me to grasp. I would sweat too much some time, and that made stopping to glass near impossible without risking hypothermia. Even with my high end Sitka gear, I still had to use it propertly in those weather conditions, which was tough.
All in all, I never did see an elk in the back country. I was able to fill my deer tag with a white tail buck, so all was not lost. And in the end it was an amazing experience that I will never forget. In fact, I am already planning for my next western hunt next year.
That being said, I am left with a number of lessons leaned, and some big questions that I am hoping some of the forum members might be able to help me out with. With all of the information overload, I feel like I have all the puzzle pies in a box, but cant figure out how to get the edges of the puzzle started.
1. Can someone help me with some insight on what local mean by "the elk arent down yet". I know that Mr. Newburg and Jacobson's videos can be a bit missleading, but it seems that everyone can find elk. I spent all of my time in areas that locals and other hunters confirmed that elk did exist in, and I focused on key habitat ares, but couldnt locate elk. Is it as simplie as "just keep getting higher in elevation"? I didnt cut a track, see any sign, nothing.
2. I dont have any experience with a bow, and don't have any one to mentor me through the archery learing process. I am a rifle hunter. Was the weather I encountered during the first week of the montana rifle season typical? based on the data I could find, I wasnt expecting the cold and snow that I saw. However, based on what the locals were saying, was the snow actually beneficial and should I be looking for deep snow during my scouting.
3. Is there such thing as just a guide in Montana? I had a blast being self sufficient and really felt a sence of accomplishement from the daily grind. In fact, after tallying up my costs for the trip (excluding gear of course) I could go back to Montana on a DIY hunt 6 to 7 times for the cost of one outfitter hunt. I would rather have 6 awesome experiences like I did, than one catered horseback/wall tent experience. That being said, it would be great to have a guide for a few days to help me get over the learning curve of a western hunt like this. I just want someone to tag along with me for a few days and teach me what to do, general areas to try, etc.
4. While e-scouting is great, and did help tremendously I feel like there is something missing. The videos I watched on the E-scouting series make it look easy. Pick a unit, find roadless sanctuary areas nearby feed and bingo, head to the field and there's the elk. But in reality the units are huge, there are thousands of areas that could hold elk, and you can only reasonably cover a dozen of those thousands. Like Remi Warren said once, its like finding a needle in a stack of needles. Yet local knowledge seems to know exactly where in the unit the elk are. So does local knowledge mean more to the process than anything else. And how is a guy who lives 2000 miles away suppose to gain that knowledge?
Visiting the western US was one of the most amazing experiences of my life so far. There is wildlife everywhere, everyone I met was warm and friendly and the skylines are inspiring. I will continue to return to take advantage of every oppertunity that I can, while I still can. Being successfull is a cherry on top of the sunday, but the trip, adventure and experience is the ice cream. And who doesnt love ice cream.
Thank you in advance to anyone who reads or is able to provide me some general direction and advice. I will be sure to take the camera out next time, and hopefully share some photos of a more successfull hunt.
During the summer of 2017, I felt like there was something missing from my life. Call it an early mid life crisis. I was approaching 40, my kids were approaching their late teen years, I had a great job and was advancing in my career and we were in the best financial position we had ever been in. However I was also riding a desk 50+ hours a week, putting on weight and was facing high cholesterol, and loosing my sense of purpose.
I had hunted, fished and trapped my whole life. Being from Ontario Canad, I spent summers on lakes and falls in the bush. Yet everry year I was getting further and further away from those passions. As fat would have it during the summer of 2017, I found the first episodes of MeatEater, and then.....Mr. Randy Newburg. Funny what a few hours of Youtube will do to change your life. After a few weeks of binge watching episodes of western elk hunting, and hearing the constant messages of the glory of western public land hunting, I found my purpose and was reconnected to what was missing in my life.
I spent almost every waking moment from the summer of 2017 to March of 2019 researching, reading books, gleaming over maps and spending countless hours on GoHunt and OnX maps websites gathering every bit of knowledge about elk hunting in Montana I could. I also hit the gym. I lost 30 pouds and gained the fitness I had in my 20s. I was fully consumed with elk hunting and the dream of a Montana and Western hunting experience. I knew that comming from Ontario I had a huge learning curve ahead of me, and an immence physical challenge to overcome.
During those years and months leading up to the draw application deadline, I also learned and immense amount about most of the western states, the draw systems, preference and bonus points and the immense oppertunities that exist in the USA. In fact, I think everyone should take the oppertunity to appreciate what and incredilble wildlife and public land system you have, and the amazing job that your resource managers do. Here is Canada, we dont have half as many oppertunities, and wildlife managers are so disconnected from the resources they manage that year after year we are loosing both opportunities and resources to hunt.
All the research and work paid off. I was successfull in drawing a general big game combo tag for the 2019 season in Montana. With tag in hand, e-scouting plans from A to Z and all of the gear ready to go, I headed to Montana. After a two and half day drive I arrived in Big Timber ready to tackle some public land hunting. I had arrived 5 days before the opening of the season, and would have 6 days total after opener to close the deal. I had planned to have this many days before the season as contingency to ensure that I had enough time to check through all of my e-scouting plans and be setup ready for opening day. Thanks to those of this forum for a bunch of advice on my plans, it was very helpfull.
The country was much different thank it appeared on maps and satelite imagery. I was well aware that this would be the case, but living my whole life at around 800 feet, seeing what 6000 and 10000 looked like was a bit of shock. I knew several things from my research and planning. I needed to find sanctuary areas as we were in the post rut period and that those areas needed to be near good food and water. I also needed to get back off of trails and roads.
I spend 5 solid days getting my butt kicked, hiking thousands of feet of elevations and as many miles as I could cover in a day. I glassed from great ridges focusing on north facing slopes. While I saw some amazing wildlife during my travels including some incredible 5x5 mule deer, a great trophy bull moose tending a cow, bears, etc. I didnt see any elk sign the whole time scouting. In fact the only elk I did see was a huge herd that were right off of a road on a farm field at 3000 feed grazing away at mid day.
Feeling very discouraged and beat up, with only day or so before opening, I went to a local bar to drown my sorrows. I was able to get chatting to the bar tender and some local who were both extremely friendly, and were able to give me some great advice. Everyone told me the same thing, the elk arent down yet?? "Oh they will be down when we get the snows in the mountains, but they arent down yet". But this was contradictory to everything I learned. I just couldnt make heads or tails about their advice.
Opening morning of the season came, and so did the weather. The temps dropped, snow fell and the weather turned to SH***T. The forest service roads that I was using as jumping off points were now innacessible. I immidiately purchased a set of chains, but the next day the wind blew drift that were impassible. While I had camped in the back country during my scouting, I am very glad that I did not camp out during the first days of the season, as I would have been snowed in on those access roads. Surely with this weather the elk would start to move. I had a few days left and did what I could. However I was now restricted to trail heads at main roads and could not get back as far as I wanted. The temps made hiking harder and learning to hike cold was hard for me to grasp. I would sweat too much some time, and that made stopping to glass near impossible without risking hypothermia. Even with my high end Sitka gear, I still had to use it propertly in those weather conditions, which was tough.
All in all, I never did see an elk in the back country. I was able to fill my deer tag with a white tail buck, so all was not lost. And in the end it was an amazing experience that I will never forget. In fact, I am already planning for my next western hunt next year.
That being said, I am left with a number of lessons leaned, and some big questions that I am hoping some of the forum members might be able to help me out with. With all of the information overload, I feel like I have all the puzzle pies in a box, but cant figure out how to get the edges of the puzzle started.
1. Can someone help me with some insight on what local mean by "the elk arent down yet". I know that Mr. Newburg and Jacobson's videos can be a bit missleading, but it seems that everyone can find elk. I spent all of my time in areas that locals and other hunters confirmed that elk did exist in, and I focused on key habitat ares, but couldnt locate elk. Is it as simplie as "just keep getting higher in elevation"? I didnt cut a track, see any sign, nothing.
2. I dont have any experience with a bow, and don't have any one to mentor me through the archery learing process. I am a rifle hunter. Was the weather I encountered during the first week of the montana rifle season typical? based on the data I could find, I wasnt expecting the cold and snow that I saw. However, based on what the locals were saying, was the snow actually beneficial and should I be looking for deep snow during my scouting.
3. Is there such thing as just a guide in Montana? I had a blast being self sufficient and really felt a sence of accomplishement from the daily grind. In fact, after tallying up my costs for the trip (excluding gear of course) I could go back to Montana on a DIY hunt 6 to 7 times for the cost of one outfitter hunt. I would rather have 6 awesome experiences like I did, than one catered horseback/wall tent experience. That being said, it would be great to have a guide for a few days to help me get over the learning curve of a western hunt like this. I just want someone to tag along with me for a few days and teach me what to do, general areas to try, etc.
4. While e-scouting is great, and did help tremendously I feel like there is something missing. The videos I watched on the E-scouting series make it look easy. Pick a unit, find roadless sanctuary areas nearby feed and bingo, head to the field and there's the elk. But in reality the units are huge, there are thousands of areas that could hold elk, and you can only reasonably cover a dozen of those thousands. Like Remi Warren said once, its like finding a needle in a stack of needles. Yet local knowledge seems to know exactly where in the unit the elk are. So does local knowledge mean more to the process than anything else. And how is a guy who lives 2000 miles away suppose to gain that knowledge?
Visiting the western US was one of the most amazing experiences of my life so far. There is wildlife everywhere, everyone I met was warm and friendly and the skylines are inspiring. I will continue to return to take advantage of every oppertunity that I can, while I still can. Being successfull is a cherry on top of the sunday, but the trip, adventure and experience is the ice cream. And who doesnt love ice cream.
Thank you in advance to anyone who reads or is able to provide me some general direction and advice. I will be sure to take the camera out next time, and hopefully share some photos of a more successfull hunt.