Caribou Gear

outstanding elk shed

I did the math slowly in my head of the two combined.............took a while but that is "funny pants feeling" big.
 
Wow! That is amazing. Can't imagine how giddy you must've been to find the match.

Pretty strong-headed to stick with it for that long, especially with being a year old.

About a month ago I gave in and asked everyone that I knew that could have found the left. None had. I figured it must be in the thick juniper as I had been every were else. Then I busted my collar bone and wasn't able to look until a few days ago.
 
It has been over two years since I found these antlers. Some have asked if I know what has happened to this bull.
Here is the story form the start. As I stated before I first saw this bull in the summer after he shed the antlers I found. His antlers were fully grown but the right G4 looked to be injured and was much shorter. He then disappeared until the week between archery and rifle season. I was able to take this picture through a spotting scope. This picture made the rounds on the net and twice I had people show it to me with the claim that their friend had taken the picture and had come close to getting the bull. I thought it was quite amusing.
The picture was taken only a few hundred yards from where I found the antlers.
 

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The day after the rifle opener the bull again vanished and I was unable to find him until Jan. even though I spent quite a bit of time looking. In Jan I was back up up in the place that I saw him in Oct and there he was with another big bull. I had gotten a better camera for Christmas and these are a few of the pictures I took that morning. I was again only a few hundred yards from where I found the antlers a month later. As you can see in the pictures he is not in the best of shape and even with the easy winter that year I was worried that he would not make it to spring. I spent a lot of time looking for his antlers that spring and never found them.
 

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When summer arrived I wondered if I would see him again and in Aug I saw what looked to be him in a hay field but there wasn't enough light to be sure. A few days later I got a better look and I was certain that the bull in the dark was him but he had regressed a good 40 inches. He still had the big bladed 4ths and the 5ths that flared in.
In Sept I was driving in a poring rain and I had a small bull run across the road in front of me. I stopped and soon a group of cows and a big bull fallowed and right behind them was this bull. They were on private but were headed in the direction of a small amount of public I could get to. I had to try even if it was raining. That afternoon a friend and I went after him. We had no problem locating the herd, they were bulging like crazy. The problem was they were across a big canyon and a good 3/4 of a mile off the the small amount of public land. We had nothing to do but sit under a tree and hope that the elk would move in our direction. With about an hour of light left a small 5 point showed below us and I had hope that things were going our way. Fifteen minutes later a bull bugled from from up the draw and it was clearly not the five point. We shifted our position and there was this bull 400 yard below us raking a tree. He had been beat off the cows by the other big bull and he was not happy about it. We looked at each other and both said he might call. We got set up and my friend let out a cow call. It was like we hooked him with a line. At about 75 yards he dropped out of sight under the crest of a hill and the next time I would see him he would be 30 yards to may left. That is when things went bad. I could not see him but the five point was also coming and was now 50 yards down wind. The five point started barking and the next time I saw the big bull he was sneaking out the bottom.

A few weeks later I spotted him all by himself well off of any public. He was in tough shape. Another fight had broken off one of his 4ths and he was limping badly. I was able to get this picture from a long ways off. I never saw him again. I am sure he found a hole some were and that is where he died.

I haven't found him or his antlers but I haven't given up hope that I will find them in some Juniper hole but in all likely hood they are where I can not get.
 

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