Early Scouting and Locating

I had been waiting everyday since finding out I had drawn a tag to get on the mountain. Now I understand that early June is not going to produce a large bull for me to look at. My idea was to find out if I could locate elk and learn about their habits and track them for the next several months. I started my first scouting trip heading into the canyon Merrill and I had seen the most bulls the previous deer hunt. The area I am talking about is several miles from any roads and was not accessible to four wheelers or people who think now that they can drive side by sides on the mountain they should. Trust me, we don't want you there. I read a lot about where elk would be and why. A major point of what I read was to find places where there were drainages. Places water would be flowing or had found its way to a pond. This particular canyon supplied both of those needs. I decided I would take the exact route Merrill and I took the previous year because it provided a great view of everything below us. I didn't walk to the highest point on the ridge, just to a spot where I could view the entire bowl if necessary. It is a giant bowl.  

As I took my first steps up the hillside to the vantage point a cow elk ran onto the trail in front  of me. She stopped as she knew something wasn't right, after pausing for a second she ran off. This was a good sign that I was in the right country. I then made it to the top of the tree line to have a better view and stated in the direction we had located elk before. Immediately in front of me I found several elk on the hillside. As I glassed them with binoculars I could see they were looking at me. I then backed up out of sight and moved to a place where trees would provide me cover while I walked up to them. I continued my walk until reaching the trees I was using for cover and to my surprise a cow elk jumped up, I froze, I didn't want to scare her so badly that she ran hard and alerted any other elk in the area. I allowed her to slowly move out of sight. I then walked to where she had been lying and to my great surprise there were approximately 30 head of elk just below me in the trees. I had never seen a newborn calf elk until this day. They were either newly born or born within a week or two of my arrival. I sat on the hillside and admired all that was on display for me. Beautiful weather, green trees and hillsides, and the great gift nature provided seeing these beautiful babies. 

I sat in that spot and took pictures and made a few videos. I sat long enough that now the cows had pushed their babies around me, I was basically surrounded by elk. I needed to move, but once again did not want to cause the elk to panic, I just needed them to move so that I could. I stood slowly and the cows started to alert to me. I heard the cows start chirping at the calves and heard the calves return with their own calls. As the elk started moving through the trees I heard something I could not believe. A bull elk bugling. This was new information to me, I just didn't know that bulls made noise like this when they were not in the rut. A bull right in front of me in the trees called out several times. This wasn't a full bugle, it was the first throaty part that sounded like a whistle. It was awesome. He bugled or called out several times. I wondered to myself if this was the same bull we had seen the year before just based on the number of calls he made. Talking for most of the morning just as a bull had done 8 months ago when we were last there. I then followed the elk into the trees and saw about twenty more elk on the hillside coming down into the trees to avoid me. As I walked I then heard what I describe as a dog barking, one bark. At the time I only knew of two things that barked. Dogs and bears. I wanted nothing to do with bear especially since cubs had just been born. After hearing the bark a few more times I left the area. Quickly. When I arrived back at my truck and found internet service I learned that cow elk will bark to alert others to danger. Awesome. 

I then went home and got on google earth and started mapping. I started looking for sources of water and sources of food. I then checked to see how close roads were and I already knew that there was not a road going through this canyon. In fact, the place these elk were located was almost dead center between two roads that were separated by about 6 miles. Once again in the same place we had seen them 8 months ago, I stood and watched another large group of elk. Same exact place.