Hunt the Herd Bull Seminar 2014

before we get started talking about huntin herd balls I want to stress something very important and that is the fact that I am NOT a professional manner I'm a regular guy who loves elk hunting just like most of you so what I'm up here telling you that is my style of learning some experiences I've had but it's not the right way it's not the only way to fun so I'm not here to say that my way is perfect it's going to work every time for you or the value of the greatest Delta hunter in the world because that's certainly not true just here to share some of my passion and excitement for elk hunting and it's adds to your your bag of tricks make you a better elk hunter that's great if it keeps you awake for an hour and gives you a soft chair that's great as well so afterwards I'll try to get down with a good 15 or 20 minutes left so we can do some question and answers that's my favorite part of it because I learned from that I learned from your questions and the experiences you've had so we'll do that we've got a box of cookies mrs. Fields is giving to us back there so feel free to get up and get some cookies or grab some on the way out and then at the end if you've been my seminars before we love giving away free gear so we've got a box full of free gear up here and I like three-word people ask questions during the question and answer and then that was left at the end bring some kids up here just have them throw it out and go crazy so we'll jump into it get started the first I wanna make sure we have a looking under steer I'm gonna take a little quiz you might be an elf gunner if your one and only role for setting the wedding date is not in September or if you plan the births of your children around the month of September or if your child's first word is ell you might be an elf kind if you locate your wife and kids at the store by whistling like an elf you or for the ladies if you answer your husband's bugle with the Calcutta or if you call the kids in for dinner with an elk bugle you might be an elf cunning you have more pictures of milk in your wallet than of your family show hands all right already spend more days in the woods and it works you might be know kind if you spent more time raking trees and you did rake in your yard last year or if you hiked for days in rugged canyons been walk through the park with your wife is too hard you might be an elk and if you have a hoochie mama and your wife is okay with it one of your most expensive clothes or camouflage you might be an elk ender if you have a year in Safeway for hanging from your rear-view mirror Johansson that's nasty know you might be no Pennock you think Cameron Haynes is cooler than Tom Brady or if you remodel your home to fit in your Elka mountain so how many up Gunners we have here now all right okay today we're gonna talk a lot about success we're out in the woods - we've got a tag in our pocket we're carrying a weapon around the seasons open we want to fill that tag but a successful hunt doesn't necessarily mean that you've killed something or filled a tag I want to make sure to stress to you there's I talk about successfully hunting herd bulls today that that's not the real definition of success for me success is defined by either when I go out in the elk woods if I learn something and it's usually learned through familiar that's a success as long as I can apply something to make me better if I go out in the elf woods and I call in a bull elk and come screaming in my face my Adrenaline's going crazy that's a successful elephant to me so when we talk about successfully hunting a herd bull and putting our tag on it I don't want to get caught up in the fact that I'm stressing that you have to kill an elk every time out to be successful because that's certainly not the not the truth it's not a competition between elk hunters I don't go out to the woods to compete against my neighbor and say I've got to kill a bigger bull than him I don't worry about score when I know honey I go out there and I look for a bullet that gets me excited and it was representative of a herd bull in the area I'm hunting and I'm more than happy with that regardless of what he scores we thought 9mo primarily over the counter tags public land if we can find a 300 inch Bowl we're usually pretty lucky and the representative bull up there a herd bull might be two to 60 to 70 class six points so score is not a big deal to me I just want to find a ball that's representative of the area and honey I love the challenge of putting a herd bull it's one bull one animal out of that entire herd and I'm focused on it's a lot more challenging and with the greater challenge comes a greater reward at the end of if I'm able to be successful so success rates trail coming we're a little quiz Herald but come on everyone who bought an alt tag last year to stand up alright so we've got probably 75 80 percent of Ibadan Delta peg last year if you did not shoot an elk last year go ahead and sit down well that got rid of about two-thirds of you if you shot a cow last year go ahead and sit down all right so we have one two three four five six seven eight nine ten eleven twelve thirteen fourteen out of say 150 in here so 10% killed a bowl last year so if you shot a Spiker rag born last year go ahead and sit down if you shot a 5x5 last you go in sit down I remember standing shot a six-pointed better last year 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 9 out of about a hundred and fifty people shot a six point last year we're beating the odds that's great if you shot a six month last year go ahead and sit down so two or three Edition on a 70 point or bigger last year congratulations that's awesome okay go ahead and sit down so I love doing that demonstration to show true success for our tree runners especially but for elk hunters in general it's not that high we show a 25 or 30 percent in this room which means a gun accomplished group of elk winners in here but on the average overall statistics say that successful elk hunts are about 10% so one elk hunting out of 10 is killing an elk every year or for an avid elk hunter you're killing one elk every 10 years now if you throw in the fact that there's some people who kill multiple elk every year that throws the odds even farther down for the folks that are down on the bottom into that making curve success on a herd bowl we saw that we saw proven right here in the statistics but two to three percent success on a herd Bowl if you look at States a lot of states published those statistics they're right in line with a few percent you're hunting a wiser animal more mature animal do survive it's 10 or 12 hunting seasons sometimes you're within a herd where the more eyes and ears and those as no senses live trying to keep them alive and you're having less targets as I mentioned you've got one end a lot of a herd of 30 or 40 sometimes the ear focus even up so why do we want to hunt a herd bowl do you like big elk right I'll fill the freezer and that's great I'll shoot a spike you know the last two or three days in a heartbeat not a problem but for the first few days left on that curveball that's the challenge I've got a week to go by I'm gonna go and try to find the big help but if I know and I'm more than happy to fill the freezer at the end of that but I love the challenge of humming in the herd bowl I love that challenger trying to make it past the cows trying to get in there to find that mature animal we talked about three keys that I feel are very important to successfully not even a herd well they do a lot of seminars on general elk hunting tactics tips and tactics methods that we use to be successful elk hunting and people always come up at first like yeah that's great from that the smaller goal but what do you do to have the big bulls you know I want to I want to hunt a big bull and every time I try that a bugle out and they turn and run away the hurtful takes his cows and leaves how do you learn a hurtful trying to talk about that and I think you'll find that a lot of the tactics we use to put the any element weren't just as well for hurt balls with a couple small modifications we talk about location talk about timing and then really talked about the tactics and the methods that we use for actually hunting the hurdles so first ones location I do all my money in hundreds on public land probably 75% is just on a general over-the-counter type tax when I walked into the Walmart I buy a tag like everyone else is about hunting finding a hurt ball in that kind of situations be difficult they're pressured by a lot of people there's fewer of them the dynamics of the herd the the bull decay ratio is a lot lower you get into a limited controlled hunt they manage it a little better keep the bolduk our ratios higher you've got a more mature age Placid animals and I love a plan for tags but unfortunately it takes a lot of points to draw a tag especially here in Utah so I don't get them up you know controlled months every year so I'm more than happy to go buy a peg and just be out there l coming so we're doing that public planning a lot of its over-the-counter the first thing I like to do is find an area focus my efforts on finding an area that has a good percentage of mature bulls a lot of states published statistics about those areas they'll give you the statistics of bolduk al ratio average age of the animals that are being shot in that unit so you get a good feel for there's a 20 percent success rate on six point bulls that's an area that's got a good mature pulls in there I might focus on that area so I look for those statistics to try to narrow down where I'm going to hunt and then I start my scouting how many of you use Google Earth show again Google Earth is an incredibly powerful application for an elephant I can jump on there once I narrow down that area I can just do a flyover of the unit and I can start picking out areas that look really good for elk hunting I'm looking for three things I'm looking for food I'm looking for water and I'm looking for bedding areas so for bedding areas I'm just looking for a north-facing slope or those are going to go in it's hotter in the middle of the day and bent down I'm looking for water sources which i moogle earth you can see the green drawers you can see the areas where they're probably going to be some water and I'm looking for open ranges where they can go out and have some feed if I can find those three things relatively close to each other and relatively far away from a road I'm going to be pretty excited about that not going to guarantee there's going to be help there but at least it gives me a jump start before I go and start spending gas money and precious time during the summer trying to locate some elk hunting GPS maps which is now on its Maps has a great application that goes right along with Google Earth also you can take it put it into your computer overlay it on to Google Earth it'll show you all the unit boundaries the private versus public land all of that so it's a great application to tie in with Google Earth and really helps me as I'm trying to really focus down I'm going on Google Earth and find this great spot and find out that there's a you know chunk of private land in the middle of it so a great application for that once I find that area of Google Earth I'll look for probably four or five six areas that look good to me then on month with my boots on the ground go out do some scouting and what I'm looking for at that point is signs of previous yacht I'm looking for cows during the summer I don't want to find the group of bowls during the summer because they might be moving 8 10 12 miles looking for cows when the rut scars I put all this time and effort to find this big group of bulls and go back there the first week they're gone and they aren't even anywhere around and I don't see another sign of L for probably another six weeks in there so what I'm looking for is a big group of cows more cows that I can find the more chances there's going to be more current Falls more mature Bulls coming in they're gathering those cows up when the rut starts and when the cows have their calves in the spring typically where they have their calves is where they're going to spend the summer and typically close to that location where those is where those bolts are going to come to start the ride so I'm looking for cows looking for the signs of previous ride looking for rubs I'm looking for Waldo's if I'm finding rubs there's a good chance that those bulls are going to be back to that same area running again that year I'm looking for backup areas as I mentioned I find five or six areas on Google Earth I want to make sure that I've got a couple of areas so that hunters move in and push the elk out or make the elk so they aren't as vocal or an item oh we struggle a lot with wolves if a pack of wolves moves in there you'll go completely quiet and push them out of there we struggled this year in Idaho I called him my first bull an item on day seven of our time this year it took us seven days to find a bowl of a bugle and that's after spending almost every week in checking trail cameras setting out trail cameras scouting new areas we moved our key out four times in those seven days and by now the fourth time we found out her develop that month so having backup plans is incredibly important if you put your all your eggs in one basket get caught and run out there you can spend your neat days and not even hear of you who are fine Donella so I have some backup plans I go and set trail cameras I love setting trail cameras that's exciting to go back and check them a month or two later I just see once they are verifiable or they're three or four cows in the area are there 40 or 50 cows in the area can you give me a chance to say okay this is my primary area there's cows all over here there's going to be a lot of goals here we had an area three years ago four years ago that we set six trail cameras out every single trail camera in that drainage kind of cows on it like crazy we had two spikes also there not a single Bowl other than that and probably 70 or 80 cows that came in on those trail cameras we went back to that area on September 12th called in three hurdles in a 24 hour period and shot three herd bulls within 60 yards of each other that magic three or four days when those purples come out of the mountains they're looking for the cows to round them up and if you can be there with those cows are when those verticals show up it's incredibly fun as an elk come here then the last thing I'll mention when it comes to location is paying attention to the weather what kind of a winner did they have what kind of a spring of the cabin or they have with a lot of moisture throughout the summer last year the reason we weren't finding out a lot of it had to do with wolves but some of them had to do with the fact that we had a pretty hard winter wasn't a terrible hard winter but it lasted a lot longer into the spring the spring was cooler and so the snow stayed on and the graphs didn't green as far up the mountain as it usually does so the cows they're moving up the mountain didn't get up to near as far as they usually do when they had their calves so they counted a lot lower elevation and they stayed there all summer they're comfortable there they were safe there and they didn't move their calves back up the mountain that meant the Bulls had to travel farther down the mountain to find the cows when it's time to ride and it took us a little while to hone that in trail cameras weren't getting very made pictures last year of cows and by the time we realized what was going on it was day seven of an eight day hunt and we had only two days really to get it done so pay attention to that you have a wet spring a lot of moisture they're going into a wet summer you hope you're not gonna have to move very far because water is going to be wherever they're acting and enough food and water in abundance they're gonna have to travel a lot so a lot of times you're finding them in pockets and they're kind of spread out waters on a short supply during a drought year you might find the elf more concentrated around water supplies so pay attention to some of that will help easier consider the location you get at that next thing we'll talk about is timing and for me I feel that timing of when I'm hunting especially honey in a herd Bowl I'm trying to have that big mature animal my timing is going to be probably more critical than the location and money and those hurdles we'll talk a little bit about the different phases of the rut but hunting a herd will they act differently from day to day and the way that you're going to approach hunting those that you're gonna use is going to change day to day as well we'll talk about the pre read what they're doing during the pre read and we'll talk about the p-trap what they're doing in the middle of the route and they also look closely at it so during the pre run during the summer the Bulls are bachelor duck they're in big herds sometimes I've seen 17 18 20 24 Bulls together during the summer really cool sight to see but about August 1st and it depends on area but some time that last part of July first part of August the bull start getting a little agitated with each other and they break up into their solo bands they move off and they wonder what I call the staging area so in the staging area they'll stay there for anywhere from a week sometimes two weeks week ten days someone there by themselves they're rubbing their antlers on trees they're betting right there they are moving very far their food and water right there there are interesting cows or anything at this point they don't want other bowls around them they're a little bit vocal some kind of deer and sound off once or twice in the morning once or twice in the evening but that's their staging area if you've ever been in an area where you get inside and there's 30 or 40 rubs just all over on trees within an area the size of this room there's six or eight beds in there good chance that's a staging area that's what that bowl goes pre-rut before he goes and looks for the cows is he's getting away from the other Bulls can be a great time to hunt those Bulls they aren't really vocal but they're very agitated if you get in close and start bugle and sometimes it's enough to fire them up and they come in there stomping in to chase you off because they don't want another bull around them after that they go down they start gathering the cattle but during that time sitting water-- can be effective it's usually fought it's that middle part of August into the last part of August weathers hot the Bulls are dipped in water probably every day not necessarily wallowing yet but coming to get a drink of water so if it's a drought year you've got a couple good water holes with trail cameras on when the Bulls are coming in - that might be a good place to go and set for a little bit Colleen could be good as I mentioned those bulls are a little bit agitated they don't want another bull coming in close so if you can get one to sound off and then sleeping close to him and get him fired up sometimes they'll come charging in I've had some experiences on August 28th August 30th that'll rival anything I've had on September 20th a bull this gets fired up and starts thrashing it comes storming in there's no cows to hold him back he's by himself and he comes flying into 20 yards they're wanting to beat up the bull that's that's anyone to challenge me over there the other thing I like to do is what I call the hybrid and its a mix between Colleen and Spock stock so spawn stock tail counters my hat's off to him they're way better del Thunder than I'd be able to slip in close to a big bull like that how many calling for me and the thrill of money isn't crawling though so I can't just leave my bugle at home I've got to take it with me and at least use it to get in close from there and then we do the kind of a spot in stock have a caller stay back behind will the shooter moves and quietly and tries to get a shot at that that can be effective that kind of year as well if the bull stayed in one area if he's talking a little bit you can sometimes slip in there while he's breaking a tree or something and get a shot the peak rut this is what everybody lives for this is that third week of September type of a thing where the Bulls are screaming their vocal all day this is exciting for an elk hunter but it can be really challenging for someone hunting to herd them because those herd bulls a lot of times don't want to leave their cows this is when the estrus is taking place this is when the breeding is taking place they don't want to come and fight another Bowl and take the chance of another bull coming in taking their cows so getting a hurt will to leave his herd and come into your setup just calling strictly can be very difficult so effective tactics again are the fiber I love that because you get the bull there very vocally and keep tabs on them but then you move them in as the shooter silently and you aren't taking a chance of bumping that bull pushing him off your rounds like this cows and and moves out another thing that works good if you can get in there especially where there's a lot of bulls hybl to calorie she oh just straight up calling just to set up with a shooter out front a collar back behind you're staying in a static position trying to pull that bull into you can be very effective we'll talk about the methods that are effective for calling and then lastly when it comes to timing you've got the post drive so after the breeding is all done the ruts over those big bowls a lot of time just move off by themselves go off and just lay in a brush patch by themself for a month six weeks completely just recovering from the rut they've got more out they've been beat up they're tired they haven't eaten they have you know they're just they're literally resting they're trying to recover before winter kicks in and they aren't usually moving much they'll come out on a no ill side and feed for a little bit good morning a little bit in the evening but then they go and lay back down to that brush pile they just don't move there they can be really tough to find let alone hunger in that time of year but a couple of effective tactics pot stock if you can get up on a high vantage point and just do some blasting after the find that bull feeding out on the ridge in the morning sometimes we'll start to back it up a little bit to find a couple bowls working together we find those out feeding in the morning or in the evening and go back the next day and just slip in quietly you'll watch them go and bed down they probably aren't moving too much and probably aren't moving too far so spawn stocks probably going to be your best method for hunting the herd ball after the ruts over so the tactics this is the meat and potatoes this is where the real excitement is for me the the tactic how do you get that bull in there yeah I found a big bull I found a group of elk that I want to go and hunt I've figured out which week of a keishon I'm taking this year this is what I'm going what's the tactic gonna be how am I going to get that bowling how many they call it into range how am I going to get within range to get a shot at it and it's going to depend on a couple things the two things we talked about location and timing my tactics are completely different if I don't have in a wide-open country versus to find honey you know the thick timber of rush in northern Idaho the tactics I use in the way that I setup are going to be different and similarly the timings going to change if I'm hunting the pre-read my tactic is going to be I'm not going to be quite as aggressive necessarily by plant in that transition period between the pre rup and the pker at that 3 or 4 days when those bulls come out of the mountains and start gathering up the cows I'm going to be really aggressive I'm going to be hunting all day going from daylight till dark as hard as I can that in my opinion is the best three or four days two hundred cheerful once they get their herds it can be a lot more difficult they're focused on their herds or focused on keeping their herds away from the other so they don't have to worry about Bulls coming in and stealing them they're moving a lot those cows were new and the Bulls were running around trying to tend the cows it can be difficult to get a verticals attention during that time not impossible at all but more difficult you can get there right during that transition period that's the trying time and it changes from state to state it changed from year to year but if I had to pick one week to go out hunting and focusing on a herd bull I'd probably be hunt around the 8th to the 15th maybe pushing it back a little bit the 10 to the 17th but after that 17th 18th on it can be pretty tough because with bulls are herded up and have their heritage so there's three dr4 tactics I'll talk about number one is water and I am a very impatient person I cannot sit for very long especially if I hear an elf you so if I'm sitting in a tree standing or sitting in a blind on the water hole and help beutel's up the canyon he's not coming to that water hole I'm leaving the water Pole so I'm not a patient person but if you're patient and you have a trail camera out there and you have a pattern of Bowl that's coming in every day at the same time it can be a very effective way to not herd bulls especially early in the season talking about spotting stock leaving your calls at home just going out and finding a bowl and trying to slip in close enough to get a shot we'll talk about calling which is my favorite setting up calling that bowl to you he comes past the shooter unaware that the shooters there the caller's back behind bringing him in comes right by for a great shot that is a blast there's nothing like having a big hurt bull coming in to 20 or 30 yards screaming in your face and getting a shot on it and then the last one is the hybrid mixing that calling and spottin stock calling for a certain amount of time and then going quiet moving in for the rest of the way for the finest job because the water locations important if you're hunting Arizona or somewhere where it's it's a dry climate water is going to be important for those el they're going to be coming to water holes every day sometimes twice a day especially during the early part of the rut and during the middle of the rut when they're worked they're spending a lot of energy water sources can be really valuable whether it's gonna play a big part of that if you're not in a year when it's really wet and there's water everywhere you have a lot of summer rainstorms sitting on water probably not going to be as effective those help move around a little bit they don't have to hit the same water hole every day there's water everywhere so patterning the elk is going to be difficult as I mentioned earlier when we're talking about the phases of the pre rup phase and the methods for that if you get either during the pre rut you probably are going to be hunting a lot of elk over a wall - an active wallow they haven't started wallowing at that point they're more coming into the waterhole okay early you're going to be looking for a waterhole water source where they're coming in and watering every day if you're having a later during the middle of the rut if you find a great big wallow that's being actively hammered every day set in the trail camera on there and see what's coming in a lot of times those bowls will come in that same part of the day every day four or sometimes three or four weeks there and you can pack them and have a great pump there and then lastly tree stand versus ambush if you're in a tree it helps with scent control a little bit your since going out above the El before it's drop them down they aren't some melanism as much your visual is a lot better from a tree stand if you're on the ground flip side though is you're stuck up in a tree so if you're on the ground you're a lot more mobile if I'm in an underwater hole I'm going to go on I'm going to set up either a little brush blind or just going to tuck myself into some brush next to the water hole it's like I mentioned once I hit an elk bugle I'm jumping up and going so I don't go through the effort of taking a tree stand and setting it up climbing up it and then climbing back down every time I hear not the bugle so there are a couple of advantages to being in the tree stand but if you're impatient like me you just want to run and gun with the elk then just setting up on a water pool is probably going to be more effective for you than climbing up in a tree spawn stock very effective also very good hunters my good friend Ron there in the picture that's all he does he very very rarely carries an elk call with him if he does it's just to locate the elk from there he's possible gets his spotting scope binoculars out sets up on a ridge finds a bowl to hunt and then goes to it and just shadows it sometimes all day they'll follow that bull staying back moving up five or 10 yards of time when the bull turns his head to keep it a little bit closer the guy is incredibly patient incredibly quiet an incredibly good hunter kills bulls like that almost every year on general tags or limited tags that are really easy to draw kill two bulls like that last year one in Montana and one in Wyoming simply by shadowing that bull that one was very early I think September 1st September 2nd didn't have any college came out on a ridge in the morning and started feeding there he slipped in followed it for a while moving in keeping the sagebrush trees between him and the bull and finally moved into range the bull turn and made a mistake it came by him and he got a shot and he does it every year the key to it is finding the own if you aren't using your calls to necessarily call them in you're either going to be blasting them setting up on a range looking for Mazar out feeding and then moving in watching or they bed similar to honey mule deer or you can use your calls to locate them and then move in from there knowing that if you're calling to them you might be quiet they might feel a little bit of pressure and move away so getting any close to calling might not be the best method there the key to it is moving in quietly so you want to get in there every time that elk makes a move turns his head or whatever you move a step or two closer but inside that 150 200 yards especially on an open country like that it can be difficult to cover that ground and get into 40 or 50 yards for a shot so taking your time being patient making moves at the right time when Phelps heads down turn away when the wind's blowing we had a bowl that was bed in several years ago and he would not come and he was bugle in every three minutes from his bed during the middle of the day but he wouldn't get up and come in so my buddy stayed back at 200 yards and said you just flipped and quiet it took three hours to get into that bowl but there was fires out here in Idaho and every time a plane would fly over it made noise and allowed me to move in five or ten yards pretty soon I popped up over little rifles bedded there 30 yards I slipped into 18 yards and even shot him out in his bed they're so spotless knocking can be very effective but it takes a lot of patience and it takes a lot more time than just get them to come in with you the bugles it's a fighting that it's usually over pretty quick spawn stock can take sometimes all day Wayne is critical in that situation you've got to be paying attention because if that bull smells anything for the wind switches you spent three hours at our belly prom on this bull you pop your head up in the wind switches it's game over so making sure that you're paying attention to what the thermals are doing if it's midday and the thermals are going up to the shadow start coming out winds gonna be switching you got to take that into account sometimes that means backing out trying to get in the next day but always pay attention to win knowing that the winds doing then as well as gonna be doing in an hour when you're still trying to get it close to that bowl then the third one is calling and for me that's the thrill I love that vocal interaction with the elk I love fooling the elk into thinking I'm in another bowl get them so mad when they come charging and wanting to fight another Bowl not even knowing that there's a shooter on the front there to get a good shot on them I love the two-person setup and I've mentioned it several times but having that caller back behind them the shooter out the front the shooter is completely silent he goes out and and post up there in a good shooting lane or several good shooting lanes the collars back behind the collars ulama making noise he's back there calling his focus is to bring that bowl past the shooter how many of you had a bowl the big Colin - Colin - it comes in 280 yards and stops out there and will not come closer if you have a shooter 40 yards out in front of sudden he's in shooting range and it's very effective it's I love hunting that way from hunting by myself I feel like I'm handicapped because I've got to bring that bull all the way in by myself and get a shot he's got me pinpoint once I make a noise that bull knows where I'm at if he comes 80 yards you can see where there should be an elk and doesn't see one he's probably not coming closer so I got ain't creative in my setups and make sure that he's not coming in and able to see me from a long ways away I've got to catch my giggles back behind me and my cow calls back behind me in the hopes of drawing him close enough that I can get a shot so having two people there's definitely an advantage there so as I'm setting up if I'm the shooter on the front I like to remember the word to mark an arc it has two meanings when I'm setting up on I'm calling it in help first one is always remember concealment AARC always you're never concealment I know I'm just trying to stay alive he's got three senses that he uses to do that it's got sight sound and smell so as I'm setting up I'm remembering to conceal myself from all three of those senses making sure the land is good he's not gonna smell me making sure that I'm set up in front of some brush so that my chemical I was able to work on concealed from his sight if I set up behind a tree or behind brush or behind a rock in come 220 yards to be right on the wide open but if I'm behind that tree I'm not getting a shot so I set up in front of obstacles let the camouflage break up my outline using that backdrop and then also sound last thing I wanna do is have to pull up 20 yards you try to draw on in here's me break the branch as I shift my way as I break a branch coming to full draw so I'm making sure the ground is cleared out my feet make sure that no branches or brush behind me it's gonna make noise when I draw concealing myself always remember concealment the second thing is an arc literally geometrically at mark so if you think of a bull coming into the collar straight line from the bowl of the collar if the wind is going across that straight line the bull is typically going to come in downwind sometimes in the middle or up they go crazy and they forget about their senses and they come flying right in that's wonderful - ninety percent of time those up they're coming in a little bit curious a little bit cautious and they're usually gonna circle down the way to make sure there's no danger there as they approach that setup so having that shooter set up on an imaginary arc that's down only to that straight line from the collar to the bowl it's very important if you set up but right in the middle of that straight line the bull circles downwind he's going to smell the shooter before he gets into a shooting your scent is coming out a little bit of a cone shape he's gonna smell that hit before he gets back a little ticking and gets into a shooting Lane so it's important to get young at least 40 or 50 yards that way if he does come storming straight in you're still within a good bow range if he comes in downwind though he's not smelling as he comes across there so I like to set up a little bit down then and get it on the same level will help with that there's a couple reasons I like to get on the same level as the help when I'm setting up number one if you're up on top of the mountain looking straight down you can see a lot better than if you're at the bottom looking up if an help comes in from above you and he's looking down he gets to 100 yards he should be able to see where you're calling from he can see where you're coming from you should be able to see help if he doesn't he's probably not coming down on the flipside if a bulls coming up the hill to yet you got to remember you're a bull elk you're up there convincing him here another Bowl L you're challenging if you want to fight in these are the physical disadvantage coming up that hill to you so again the bowl to come charging straight up a mouth to you can be difficult as well to get on the same level kind of eliminates their visual advantage makes them feel like they're not at a physical disadvantage it makes me feel more comfortable to come in the second thing it does is think about the thermal what are they doing throughout the day in the morning they're coming down there in the day they're going up it typically don't blow side Hill there's a storm or something sometimes we get swirling winds but if the wind switch is if you're moving in on an elk it usually goes from blowing down a little blowing up billet or going uphill to downhill if you're coming in at the same level is that helping that the wind switches on you chances are it's not going to be as bad and he'll probably not going to smell you because it's either going to blow down and up or up and down if you're coming down that same level you've still got a little bit of leeway there so I like to get on the same level as the L can move in helps me with the thermals helps with the Elks physical advantage helps with the with my visual advantage and makes it a lot easier to call them out so I get on the same level and again I can't stress enough the importance of paying attention to the wind if an elk expels you the Hunts over once in a while to get a bowl that's so dumb in the rut that he forgets to be just melt something will come in anyways because it just keeps hearing that cows down but typically 99% of time if the bull smells you get your limp the Hunts over so always pay attention to the wind when it comes to Colleen I get questioned a lot why are you so aggressive why do you bugle so much we had somebody on opening day and I know this your left a nice note on our pickup back to it said if you're up the strangest morning you Google way too much I'll admit I do but I love it and it works so we've got a really good system work really well for us for calling in small bowls big bowls it doesn't matter any Bowl think about what Apple's thinking about in September to emotions that they have they either want to fight or they want to breathe if you're playing to one of those two emotions on the right day there's a good chance that Bulls gonna come in if it's a day that Bulls wanted to breed and he's got a cow that's hot you're giving him some good Cal calls that might be on things you might not mean to beautiful but if that bull has his cows and he's just tired to get pestered by other bulls and he's ready to fight you've got a challenge in and make him want to fight so play into their emotions I always start out with the cow call I can get a bull come in with a cow call that's simple if he wants to come into a cow call and he's excited to check that out I'll give him cow calls all he wants to hear as long as he's coming in the key to calling a bull with bugles and challenging them to get in those being close if you're 400 yards away from this bull and you're throwing out a challenge after challenge after challenge to him he's a lot of times gonna grab his collar he's gonna hurt him up and he's going to move out and that's what a lot of people you'll hear to say you can't call in herd bulls they grab their causal move I've chased before for miles now England they won't turn and come back in the key to calling in any all especially a herd bull is getting in close to him before you challenge them so our our main method is going up on a ridge it's really not a location be able to find an elk the location feels just like a - note bugle carries that final it out there it goes across the canyon all I'm saying is I'm an elk up here there any other element there sounds like this nothing aggressive not a lot of intensity I just want that note to carry out there go on for health to hear it from a mile away and you go back once I hear you go back I know there's a bowl there then I can move in and start my actual calling set up so I move in close as the caller never we have two people so the shooters up front as the caller back behind my table is just bringing that bowl in front of the shooter we get on the same level we get the wind in our favor and then the color drops back and it depends on the train if you're not in wide open country sometimes it's gonna have to be a hundred yards hundred twenty yards in thick brush or heavy timber sometimes we get away with being a lot closer but forty to sixty yards is kind of that magic range that I found that those bowls typically can't see where you're at they come in at least within range of this huge on the front so my job is with collars bring that bull in and I start out with just how stones like I mentioned if he's excited about cows all I have to do is give some cow sounds he's going to come in nothing hyper that's justice McHale sells that bull here's cow sounds and he wants to cow that date he's going to come into those cows tones now if he doesn't want to cow that day and he's not want to get up and his or leaders or whatever he's still probably gonna respond to that cow it's September he's gathering a heard he's thinking about the rug he's thinking about breeding he hears cows tubs and you're inside that 120 to 150 yard range he's probably going to bugle back at you or make some kind of anyways he might not be aggressive he might not be meaning anything but he's gonna make a noise that's when I challenge him as soon as he makes that noise when I'm cutting him off like hammering him with all the intensity and emotion frustration anger everything I can to challenge him and my challenge people sounds like this you hear the difference in intensity between that location vehicle let me go back-to-back we'll leave the location you go first another challenge you hear the difference in intensity the lkm - they react by emotion do you get in close to a bull elk and you Cal called him and he responds and says hey it's September I'm a bull you're a cow and all of a sudden this Creek big bull comes screaming or the top of men challenge says huh huh this is my Cal here 120 or hundred fifty yards away from him he loses his mind first thing he thinks of his eyes rolled back in his head he comes charging he's like I'm gonna beat up that bullet and that's what I want to get that bull to say I want to get him so mad he comes didn't want to beat me up because when he does he drops his guard he forgets about his senses he's slobbering all over himself he comes running in there wanting to beat me up well music caller I pulled him back across the front of the shooter the shooter gets a good shot and it's game over so honestly that is our sequence it's that simple a Cal serum and a challenge people and the key to it is being close that won't work from 300 or 400 yards away typically typically you've got to be inside that hundred and fifty is kind of like all the redzone if you can get inside that zone and challenge a bowl like that there's a good chance he's coming in works on big bulls little bulls we added seminar in Denver about a month ago and had several people come up yeah but we've got so many rad courts here if we view like that they're all going to turn and run to Utah so they won't if you're close if you're a long ways away yeah they will we've called in spikes literally got in a hundred yards from a spike that was sitting there didn't know if he has a cow or a bull he was tackling you do glee is the craziest thing I let out some cow calls he left this little squeal and I hammered him off the biggest challenge really you can imagine his eyes rolled back in his head and started foaming at the mouth he ran into ten yards and stood there still didn't know what's down the mink but it's a naturally emotion within them that during September that testosterone is kicking in and when they be challenged like that they just coming on to fight so it works on little Bulls big Bulls especially hurdles it can be effective but again I can't stress enough the key is getting it close so you've got a slipping quiet to get set up get in there on that ball then set up inside that red zone give him the cow call when he responds challenging now on the flip side if you were to bugle first from that range he can cut you off and challenge you and then he's basically put the ball of your court and saying alright buddy to come in closer even people that challenge you come up here and let's fight and as you stay back there giving Cal calls and bugles again he's like God so I thought you're not tough enough here to come up here to get loses interest grab his cows and leaves always respond back to him Cal call first to get him to respond once he vehicles then you cut him off with the Beagle you put the ball on his court you've challenged him and it's up to him to come into you a couple other options for calling in hurdles I love breaking a tree it's picking up a stick is the collar I let out of you and I start thrashing a tree with the stick like the Bulls do that's a display of dominance for them cuz I miss playing dominus sometimes that might come in with just a call they start displaying dominance it's like that's it you've challenged me now you're trying to act like you're tougher than me and they'll come flying in the other thing I love about raking is when you start raking a tree it's a display of dominance and that bowl off time to start doing the same thing to display his dominance when a bull starts raking a tree prime time as a shooter on for us to get up and move in 10 yards 20 yards 30 yards sometimes move all the way and shoot that ball was heads down I hadn't closed he's making sound it's a great time to stock in on that ball I had a ball probably five or six years ago that what not great this from his cows would come down the hill 40 or 50 yards start breaking a tree and then go back up to the cows and back and forth my buddy is back behind probably 100 yards Collin did it for probably 40 minutes on the same thing that the cows are bedded up there the bull was fired up but he just wouldn't come down to leave his cows my buddy started raking the tree that ball came down to 50 yards 50 yards down the hill and Starr dracomon treating hearing that tree for 15 minutes while he was raping that I was slippin up the hill and I went from 120 yards into 55 yards pulled up rangefinder hit me about 55 yards it's inside my range he doesn't know I'm Gary's quartered away but I can get closer I slipped into about 43 yards pulled up the rangefinder native min 43 yards to look for turn away head down turn him this tree up 43 yards that's a chip shot not moving doesn't climb here but I get closer I shot that bull quarter in at 35 yards to get no idea I was there didn't know I needed been shot I shot him and he jumped a little bin stood there looked around and walked off about 15 yards and fell over right there so ranking a tree can be very effective to get in close on a hurt pool the other thing we like to use is decoys decoys are kind of a last resort for me not because they don't work but just because I don't have you figured out there's no rhyme or reason for me why or when decoys work sometimes you throw up a decoy and a bull will come running from 300 yards into it other times you pull one up in the bull whirl and run and act like he's scared of it so if I'm calling to a bowl and I've got visual he just won't come in sometimes as a caller I was taking a heads-up beep I pulled out there to flash him a little bit give a couple of Cal calls and then drop it back down just to give him that visual confirmation that ok and here it is down there I'm seeing an elk I think it's safe to go in so a decoy worked good the thing I don't want to do is get out there and use it first and take a chance secure in that bull the way but at that point it's 50/50 if I'm having troubles getting that bull in sometimes a decoy works sometimes it won't it just in crews my my chance to get closer title after I've tried everything else and then the last method is a hybrid this is just a combination of spot and stalk and calling are calling sequence and setup and everything in the stable but get it as close as we can we threw out some cow sounds we get the bold of vehicle we cut him off we do that as much as we can sometimes it just doesn't work sometimes those herd bulls have been pressured you've got a cow that's indeed they don't want to leave and we can if those bowls to break loose come into our set up at that point as the shooter I just get up and start spottin stalker caller still back there working his magic keeping the bull active people local the shooter just gets up and moves in keeping tabs on that bowl once you get a visual then you're moving very slow just like a spawn stalk your patient you're taking your time waiting for that Bowl to make a mistake wait for an assert back behind the herd and come into bow range and give you a shot again like inside 150 yards before we start this and if we get in there sometimes it works great a lot of times out in front as a shooter I'll be calling that when closer than the collar back behind I'm threatening that ball a little bit I'm inside that red zone and pressuring him a lot and then as he starts responding the collar back behind will kind of take over bowls fired up at that point I can move in as the shooter on the front good shot we've got a really good video here that demonstrates from this past season in Idaho the hybrid situation that we talked about so we've located a bull from across the canyon a day like that morning to drop down in the bottom and we're trying to just pinpoint where he's at right here gave a couple cow sounds he bugle my buddy dirts there before time world champion elk color it's always good to have somebody like that callin for you aiming back behind I went out in front is my day to shoot his day to call and we slipped in on this ball got into probably 120 hundred and fifty yards owns you can see it's thick timber there we were able to move in pretty close to them before we start feeling like we're going to pressure and our bumpkin we may be a little more volume than half so the Bulls off my left and some real thick brush I've turned my head to the right to calc all to try to pull em across into some more open country there to our right and it worked he be able from straight up ahead of me there so I moved up into the open good spot to set it up got a good cover to keep you coming he's got to come in close to us there really good set up on confident in this point I'm still calling Dirk's back behind you probably 60 yards and I'm still calling putting pressure on that bowl and you see there he called as soon as he called I cut him off with the challenge in Google moved ahead of you feed getting close enough now that feeling I shouldn't be able to see him out there about 100 yards so both Dirk and I'm you when that hole thinks there's two holes down there getting fired up about something he's got his cows up there but you can't leave us alone he knows there's something going on we're challenging him every time you were focused on his bugle not necessarily calling back and forth to each other but calling it over the top of the bull when he duels at this point I kind of glimpse I've been moving through the timber up there I set my bugle down I'm done calling at this point but I also know that break and that bull away from his herd might be pretty tough he's got towels up there he's been puking all morning moving up the mountain so that seemed to go across look there I go into spotting stock at this point I'm thinking I'm probably a beautiful on the edge of that timber where I keep seeing him to get into a shot again dirt cuts him off every time the bull bugles dirt cuts him off with a challenge muta fortunately you got tired of us pester an image challenge and even you turn to K minute to hear him hear his hooves hitting the rock so they came through the boulders that are coming down to us now again this is day 7 in Idaho this is the first Bowl we've called in in seven days this is over the counter unit in the middle of one of the most heavily funded and heavily wolf infested areas in Idaho keeping a little suspense 30 full film will be shown at the full draw film tour here in Salt Lake this summer so if you want to see the whole thing it's about 18 minutes all of our dead batteries are 15-mile hike days because we've got stranded and our battery died in our truck all the fun that goes into elk hunting seven days I'm not fighting to know that being our first calling you get to see the shot and then the exciting aftermath of that so that's how it works for us I love getting out in the front like that fortunately that time the bull turn came in but that was the start of our our hybrid moving in on that bull when he's up there with his cows moving back and forth trying to just move in silently patiently getting in there and finding that shot in a nutshell it's important to scout if you're wanting to hunt a herd bull if you want to hunt that representative animal of area that one animal out of the herd if that's your challenge and that's what's exciting for you you've got to hunt somewhere where there are hurdles so scouting is important getting in shape is important we started our hunting about 5,000 feet and shot that elk at about 76 hundred feet that was the first bullet we called it in seven days we hunted we hiked 65 miles in the first six days on GPS without a single call you being in shape is important especially hunting public land and over-the-counter type tags if you draw a good go out there they're Bulls running everywhere yeah you can get by without being cheap but the more that you're able to do the more dedication and then put in right now during the offseason to be in shape the better chances are that you're going to be able to try down l can get in on a fresh shot extend your shooting not saying you have to be proficient in 120 yards and be able to shoot me I look that far that's way outside my range but I practice every day out to 100 yards I would never shoot that far on the field but shooting at 100 yards it makes me feel really comfortable when I'm shooting at 40 yards it seems a lot easier my form is a lot better because at a hundred yards of every little thing that I do wrong is magnified about 4x when I'm shooting 30 yards so I practice out to long ranges just so that uncomfortable inside my shooting range it extends my range a little bit more because I'm spotting and stalking it can be difficult to get into 20 yards on those poles it can happen if you're a big country dude a lot of times when you spot the stalk on those bulls even a hybrid your shots gonna be out there at 40 or 50 yards so practicing at longer ranges makes you feel a lot more confident shooting 40 or 50 yards or whatever your effective range is with the bow be flexible and versatile we moved our camp four times in seven days last year I've learned lessons in the past of putting all eight of my days into one basket and not getting into any L components last day and I'm desperate and panic my hunts almost over that wasted the entire time because I haven't able to plane tell I'm versatile and mobile and moving continually until I find her develop to hunt and my tactics are going to change sometimes day to day if Kali is not working spawn stock might work we're in Wyoming last year first four days l4 screaming their heads off is the most insane bugling action I heard we didn't call in a single belt fill every time we got inside 200 yards I've tried the Cal color bugle they'd go quiet move away we had to switch up our tactics and started they were very vocal so it made it easy to spot stalk them but every time we try to call it in close they were good quiet so we had to change our tactics from calling to simply spots talk we'd locate a bull move in just keep silent until they made a mistake be versatile in that and then be realistic what is your goal is it a 400 inch Bowl did you draw the San Juan archery tag this year yeah you can set some goals like that if you want to or you have an eye to the over-the-counter and heavily wolf pressure Darien your goal might be to hopefully hear an elder and foresee an element be realistic in those knowing your expectations ahead of time don't pass up a ball on the first day you shoot on the last day and love when people say that I've passed up so many elephant first day that's bent the next six days trying to find if I couldn't find any other help I'll she despite when the last day but I'm probably not gonna shoot one on the first day so but be realistic and that know what you wanted you to know what you're trying to accomplish and then go out there and accomplish that and most importantly have fun that's why we all said it's not a competition at the L Fenner's it's a competition between you and the hill you're trying to convince them that you're another health you're trying to overpower their senses and get in there and get a shot on them it's not to help do your neighbor fun little side bets are on honey melt but when it becomes a competition it takes the fun out of it it puts pressure on you to go out shoot a bigger bowl than somebody else and it takes that fun away from it remember why we might remember the thrill of the excitement of the hunt is being out there an experience of some of those things success is defined by you make sure that you're defining it realistically and having fun as your team in that success so thanks for coming I'd love to stay and chat and answer any question we've got about 10 minutes 15 minutes or so until we've got to be completely out of here but we're over at the extreme health magazine booth anybody wants to come over there's a booth 710 I'll stand out there and chat up until 7 o'clock tonight if you guys want to so I love answering questions we love asking questions getting your experiences over feel free to fire on some questions and before we get out of here on all the kids that are here to come up I've got something special for you up here and I've got this box full of gear so I'll record questions with it I'll throw out some gear and it's only your experiences with questions

Channel: Backcountry Addictions

Views: 29,378

Rating: 4.7765365 out of 5

Keywords: Killing the herd bull, Corey Jacobsen, elk101.com, Hunting the herd bull, elk hunting, Fulldraw film tour, seminar, Hunting (Magazine Genre), elk calling, how to call in big bulls, how to call to the herd bull, 7 time world champion elk caller, cow calling, #backcountryaddictions, backcountryaddictions.com

Id: uszcTU1DbXE

Length: 51min 49sec (3109 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 17 2014