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Hi everyone,
I just read Trackdog's tale about moose hunting in the Alaska hunting section and it reminds me a lot of elk hunting in North Idaho. You better have a way to get 'em out! Lots of people use horses, mules, ATV's etc. to get their elk out. Some people, in much better shape than myself, simply pack out the quarters from wherever they shoot 'em. The rest of us make sure the elk are on the upper side of a road and hope they don't run down any hidy holes!
Truthfully, one of the reasons I moved west was for elk hunting. The first year I hunted here my buddy shot a beautiful bull WAAAYYY DOOWWN the mountain from the camp, on the steep south facing slopes on the opposite side of the mountain from the road, which came up a ridge from the north. First elk for any of us. It took three guys ALL DAY to pack that elk out, and at that the pieces kept getting cut into smaller and smaller chunks. Having just moved the previous year from sea-level farmland I could barely make it up that slope with my rifle and pack, worse yet packing meat! It dampened my elk-hunting enthusiasm considerably, I'll tell you. I still go, mind you, but these days I hunt with my father-in-law and we are mighty careful about where we shoot anything. The upside is you get to watch animals that you know you ain't gonna shoot. When I see a 7x7, then I'll consider a shot down in one of those holes! I always heard elk hunting was tough, but I always thought they meant it was tough to GET an elk. What they really meant was it's tough ONCE you get an elk! IDShooter
I just read Trackdog's tale about moose hunting in the Alaska hunting section and it reminds me a lot of elk hunting in North Idaho. You better have a way to get 'em out! Lots of people use horses, mules, ATV's etc. to get their elk out. Some people, in much better shape than myself, simply pack out the quarters from wherever they shoot 'em. The rest of us make sure the elk are on the upper side of a road and hope they don't run down any hidy holes!
Truthfully, one of the reasons I moved west was for elk hunting. The first year I hunted here my buddy shot a beautiful bull WAAAYYY DOOWWN the mountain from the camp, on the steep south facing slopes on the opposite side of the mountain from the road, which came up a ridge from the north. First elk for any of us. It took three guys ALL DAY to pack that elk out, and at that the pieces kept getting cut into smaller and smaller chunks. Having just moved the previous year from sea-level farmland I could barely make it up that slope with my rifle and pack, worse yet packing meat! It dampened my elk-hunting enthusiasm considerably, I'll tell you. I still go, mind you, but these days I hunt with my father-in-law and we are mighty careful about where we shoot anything. The upside is you get to watch animals that you know you ain't gonna shoot. When I see a 7x7, then I'll consider a shot down in one of those holes! I always heard elk hunting was tough, but I always thought they meant it was tough to GET an elk. What they really meant was it's tough ONCE you get an elk! IDShooter