My two oldest kids drew cow elk tags this year on Deseret Land & Livestock. It’s not uncommon to see online forum posts asking for information about this hunt so I figured I’d share our experience. We elected to do the DIY option, the guided option was more expensive than what I wanted to pay and I figured that I could navigate around well enough that we’d have reasonable chances at success. Historically the success rates for this hunt are 85 to 90 percent so I kind of had a “how hard could it be” mentality. We received the emails and letters from the guide service that oversees the hunting on the Ranch with all the instructions to get prepared. We did not participate in the shooting class so the only requirement that we did have was to present the required signed release forms the first morning that we checked in. This year the DIY hunters were given a 9 day window between Nov 11th and 19th with no hunting on Sunday (13th) or Wed (16th) so we arranged our calendar accordingly.
Opening Day
I woke the kids up at 4am and we were out the door by 4:30am. We stopped briefly at a Maverik to get a sandwich for lunch and headed back into Utah to the Ranch. We arrived at the check point just after sunrise and the line to get checked in was rather long. It took several minutes to get checked in because the guides were very thorough in providing maps and detailing the rules, open roads and gates, and communication expectations. We drove through the gate and immediately it was combat hunting at its finest. Every DIY hunter is required to enter through the same check point so everyone is bottlenecked into the same starting location. This made for long lines of vehicles and mad scrambles to win the footrace to herds of elk. It took several hours, probably until about lunchtime for everyone to disperse enough to feel like you were out of the rat race. A herd of maybe 20+ elk was spotted out in a large meadow and there were dozens of trucks pulled off to the side of the road and dozens of orange vested hunters racing out into the meadow to try and get a shot. We stopped the Expedition and watched the chaos briefly, Logan was a little mystified by this and said, “Dad, I don’t like this vibe.” So, we continued driving around for several hours exploring the ranch a bit.
A couple hours later we were driving around back by the meadow where that herd of elk was earlier and I spotted a calf running around searching for its mother which was certainly killed in the chaos of the morning. We decided to try and make a stalk on it and started hiking towards the calf. We were hiking along a small ridge and I noticed another hunter hiking towards the calf just below us down the bottom of the draw. I pulled the kids back and conceded that we had lost the footrace.
We headed out driving again and decided to make our way out into the eastern flats of the ranch. We spotted a small herd that had a young bull and 4 cows. Looking on the map, it looked like there was a 2-track road that would take us very near where the herd was heading. We took that 2 track and sure enough it took us to within 300 yards of the little hollow where the elk had started bedding down. We got to within 200 yards and I tried getting Lauryl set up on the shooting sticks but she never could get steady enough for a shot and the small herd eventually stood up and ran off. I realized afterwards that I should have had her set up lower to the ground, she was standing but I should have had her kneel or sit.
We were prepared to head back to Evanston and check in to a motel for the evening and come back in the morning. However, throughout the day we noticed a growing odor of coolant and when we pulled into the parking lot at Walmart smoke billowed from under the hood of the car. I popped the hood and noticed antifreeze dripping, not so slowly, from the heater hose. Luckily there is an AutoZone near the Walmart. Unfortunately, they did not have the replacement part in stock. Ironically the nearest location that had the part in stock was in Utah just a couple miles from our house. We took one for the team and cruised home as quickly as we could and got the replacement hose. We debated whether or not to wake up early again on Saturday and do it all over again, but we were all very tired decided to sleep in on Saturday and try again another day.
The Last Saturday
The only other day that we could make work was the last Saturday. None of us wanted to wake up at 4am again, so I booked a motel room in Evanston for Friday night. We ended up getting sidetracked a bit Saturday morning because Lauryl got car sick on the way out to the ranch and we had to make a pit stop. We arrived at the check in tent well after first light but it was obvious that the number of hunters was dramatically reduced and Logan liked this vibe a lot better. We drove through the gate and didn’t make it very far before spotting a herd of probably 40 elk at the edge of the meadow in a little north facing hollow. I could see two vehicles and hunters already making their way toward the herd but I figured there were plenty of elk out there for us too. We spotted more elk coming up out of the creek bottom and I noticed that the other hunters had actually turned their focus to those elk and were no longer looking at the elk in the little hollow. We made a gameplan to loop around to the south on the backside of the little ridge staying out of sight of the herd in the hollow and pop up over the ridge on top of them. If it worked we should have a chip shot. The plan worked like a charm and when I peeked over the ridge and saw the tops of their heads they were 200 yards away and looking away from us. Both kids got set up but neither had a clear or steady shot, and Lauryl eventually said her hands got too cold so she didn’t want to shoot. The elk caught on to us so I turned my attention to Logan and we got him into a better position with a clearer shooting lane. A calf lagged behind the herd as they slowly exited the hollow. I gave it a couple of cow calls that got it to stop and turn to look back at us. Logan made a great shot and she took 2 steps before toppling over.
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We dragged it to the Expedition and tossed it in the back. It was about 10:30 and we still had Lauryl’s tag to fill. I wasn’t sure how much longer we would need to be out there hunting and driving around so when we stopped for lunch I unloaded Logan’s elk and skinned it while the kids ate and took a little power nap.
After lunch we drove around to kill time during the early afternoon waiting for it to get closer to evening. At about 3:30pm we were pulled off the side of the road and I was just glassing a bit when a pickup truck pulled up next to us and rolled down the window. It was one of the guides and he asked if I was seeing anything. I told him that we hadn’t seen anything in a little while. He asked how many tags we had left and I told him that our only tag remaining belonged to my 14 year old daughter. He said, “follow me.” We drove for about 45 minutes (recklessly at times) across the ranch to where a herd of 200 elk had been spotted by another guide. We arrived at the herd and there were a couple other guides there waiting for us. When Lauryl hopped out with the rifle and walked up to them they smiled and told her that they were going to help her kill an elk in the next couple minutes. One of the guides went with Lauryl & I while the other guide stayed in his truck. Things turned into a bit of a rodeo and the herd started running off before Lauryl and I were in position so we hustled back to the Expedition and hurried up the road to where the second guide had driven up to cut the herd off. The second guide had split the herd after they started running and had pinned 3 calves down about 350 yards away along a fenceline. I knew that I had to get Lauryl to inside 250 yards for her to be comfortable so the guide stayed at the truck and kept cow calling while I walked with Lauryl down to the fenceline. We kept easing our way closer until Lauryl said that she felt that was close enough. There was a wood fencepost that was the perfect height so I had her get set up with that as a rest but she struggled to get comfortable and she wanted to sit down to shoot. We adjusted and she got set up in the sitting position and we waited, all 3 calves were standing looking at us straight on so none of them were giving us a shot. The guide had identified one of them as a bull calf that was slightly bigger than the other two so we waited for him to give us a shot. It felt like it took forever and we were running out of daylight so I just told Lauryl that I wanted her to shoot the first one that gave her a broadside shot. Eventually one turned broadside and I told Lauryl to shoot as soon as she was comfortable. She made 2 great shots and the calf toppled over. I wasn’t exactly sure how she was going to handle pulling the trigger then walking up to an animal that she had killed but she was excited and proud… the smile says it all.
The guide drove over and chatted with the kids telling them stories of the celebrities that he’d guided on the big bull hunts while I did the gutting… he didn’t spare me a good-natured ribbing as he watched me wrestle that calf by myself while he and the kids chatted & laughed telling me that I was taking forever and that if I had blood beyond my knuckles then I was doing it wrong. Let’s just say I was pretty much covered in blood because I was trying to get the gutting done quickly before it got dark and really cold & I’m not exactly proficient at the traditional gutting method since most of the critters I’ve killed have required quartering and packing out! And then to have to do all that with an audience, especially a guide watching me who probably could have had it gutted, butchered, grilled, and eaten in the time it took me to get it field dressed! He threw me and the elk in the bed of his truck while he and the kids climbed into the cab and he drove us back to where the Expedition was parked. We loaded the elk into the back of the Expedition and he escorted us through one of the locked gates so that we wouldn’t need to backtrack 45 minutes back through the ranch to get to the check station to check out.
I have to be honest, I generally have some tentativeness when it comes to interacting with guides but these gentlemen were phenomenal and I really feel like they took it upon themselves personally to help a young lady fill her tag. If those guides are an indication of the entire operation there at Deseret, it’s top notch.
We decided to just hustle home and let me tell you the reaction that I got when I walked in the door to the house was something to behold. I hadn’t taken the time to clean myself up after gutting the elk so I was still covered in blood & my wife was somewhat shocked to see just how messy I was. My dog wouldn’t let me out of her sight and was typically right on my heels sniffing at my dirty pant legs and licking at the dried blood on my hands. Then when I unloaded two elk from the Expedition onto the garage floor the dog spent quite a bit of time sniffing around the carcasses. I skinned Lauryl’s elk and quartered both, using my two ladders to separate and cool the meat and called it a night at about 11pm.
My house is north facing so my garage stays nice and cold in the winter, we jokingly refer to it as our “three car fridge” this time of year so I let the quarters hang through Thanksgiving and took up the butchering process in earnest Thanksgiving evening. I butchered the elk and got all the roasts and steaks in the freezer over the course of that weekend & then spent another week making about 70 pounds of snack sticks and summer sausage that the kids really enjoy.
With all the hype that accompanies tags like this I really wasn’t sure what to expect… looking at the success rates it’s not unreasonable to think a hunt like this would be easy. The chances that we got we had to create using the knowledge of how to use the terrain to our advantage and even more importantly how to leverage the pressure of other hunters to our advantage. We had multiple opportunities at elk in the sub-300 yard range over the 2 days that we hunted which made it a great experience for the kids. There were two experiences that I’ll never forget. First, peeking over the ridge with Lauryl and seeing that herd of 200 strung out across the flat at 600 yards, turning to her and asking if she sees all of them, watching her jaw drop and she whispered to me, “Oh my gosh, Dad, look at them all!” Second, watching Logan struggle with that calf dragging it downhill to the road after I had just dragged it three times the distance uphill and hearing him grunt and groan about it being hard work. He’s nearly sixteen so all I hear about is how he’s “jacked” or “ripped” or “swoll”, or how tough he thinks he is, or how awesome or invincible he thinks he is. I loved watching him go through that struggle of something that was difficult and get the task accomplished… but I also loved giving him a hard time that maybe he should show his dad some respect for being stronger than he thinks!
Rifles
- Logan used Grandpa's Remington Model 700 in .30-06 with some 180gr Hornady 180gr Interlocks that I handloaded.
- Lauryl used a Mossberg Patriot in 7mm-08 with 139gr Hornady Superformance GMX that I picked up from www.wideners.com several years back
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