Highground
Member
I took my brother in law out to a spot for the Montana rifle opener that always seems to have a few decent 4 point Muleys. We stayed overnight in the "sticks" with our hammocks and sleeping bags, we had patterned some elk coming into a field (type 1 bma adjacent to public) to feed for the 2 previous days. Actually we had those 2 days before the opener to scout only because my 14 year old daughter decided last minute she wanted do hang out with friends instead of doing the youth hunt, which bummed me out but of course I want her to have fun hunting and dont want to pressure her so me and uncle Kenny were off just us two. Anyways back to the hunt, so after a long night of listening to coyotes which came pretty close at one point, we packed up the hammocks and made way up to where we had seen the elk, it was 4 am when we started. A long, slow walk in the dark brought us the moment we had been waiting for. After sitting in our trees for about 10 minutes, like clockwork, these elk come up to the field and begin to move right towards. We think were golden, we both smile. I remind him not to shoot the bulls(4 total with one real fine 7 pt) as we are in a cow only unit, and I range them at 400 yards. Im shooting a 7mm mag that Im comfortable at that range with but Im unsure about Kenny shooting his .243 at this distance, so we wait. Why not, their heading right to us and we have a 25 mph wind in our faces, its perfect. The elk know something somehow and decide to take a left, heading now away from us slighly. I know its already over but he isnt ready, we chase behind a dip in the field and run like hell to get into position to intecept them when they come around the knob. This almost works as we come up we see them again, but this time they are moving faster and have a side by side coming at them from across the 1/4 mile long field....Im in shock. The elk are 350 yards and stopped at the fence to private getting ready to jump, I tell Kenny not to shoot and we both stand up from the prone and watch as the elk single file jump the fence and head into private drainage and the side by side with 2 guys in it pull up jump out and hop the fence with their rifles. Oh well I think, at least we dont have to haul out 400-500 lbs of meat. 
We walked back up to our tree hideout after not hearing any shots and started glassing. Glassed up 4 nice bucks grazing maybe 1000 yards out. Long story short we made an absolutely impossible stalk in the open on this group of bucks. It took about 2 hours total with quite a bit of crawling stopping and stare downs before Kenny took the biggest one in the bunch.
He harvested this guy with a .243 at about 65 yards. Perfect shot, buck jumped ran about 5 steps and toppled. My new hunting partner could not believe what had just happened. I let the rest go as I knew we had a long day ahead of us already he was a heavy bodied buck and that stalk along with running after elk plain took it out of me. Im not that old yet but Im definitely not as tough as I once was. I am paying for it today, but Kenny is tickled pink and I feel just fine with letting my brother enjoy his time. Hope everyone has a great hunting season. I hope get back into the elk next week when I go along to help my sisters husband fill his little snowys rifle elk permit. I am going to attempt to take video of this hunt, good luck to all others out there and be safe.
We walked back up to our tree hideout after not hearing any shots and started glassing. Glassed up 4 nice bucks grazing maybe 1000 yards out. Long story short we made an absolutely impossible stalk in the open on this group of bucks. It took about 2 hours total with quite a bit of crawling stopping and stare downs before Kenny took the biggest one in the bunch. He harvested this guy with a .243 at about 65 yards. Perfect shot, buck jumped ran about 5 steps and toppled. My new hunting partner could not believe what had just happened. I let the rest go as I knew we had a long day ahead of us already he was a heavy bodied buck and that stalk along with running after elk plain took it out of me. Im not that old yet but Im definitely not as tough as I once was. I am paying for it today, but Kenny is tickled pink and I feel just fine with letting my brother enjoy his time. Hope everyone has a great hunting season. I hope get back into the elk next week when I go along to help my sisters husband fill his little snowys rifle elk permit. I am going to attempt to take video of this hunt, good luck to all others out there and be safe.
