Tips for Success: Have a Long Term Plan

I saw a thread on a western hunting forum a while back that really piqued my interest… the primary question was an inquiry how guys who apply across many western states plan ahead so they don’t end up with too many tags one year and not drawing anything in other years. The thread morphed into a discussion on building an extended plan for applying and drawing tags. I was both surprised and intrigued by the detail and how carefully thought out many of the responses were. I sat down with the intent of building my own extended plan just to see if I could do it. I figured that this would be a simple exercise… it didn’t take long before I felt like I was sitting in front of a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle.
I found these questions critical in constructing my plan:
- What species do I want to hunt and where do I want to hunt them?
- How many tags can I reasonably expect to get each year?
- For tags that are issued through a drawing system, do I have contingency plans for years that I an unsuccessful in the drawings?
So let’s attack each of these questions.

What species do I want to hunt and where do I want to hunt them? If I didn’t have to choose I think I would hunt just about anything that walked around on four legs, but since time and money are both limiting factors for me I have identified four species that make the cut.
Deer - Starting at 14 years old I began hunting deer and the Utah general buck deer hunt is a family tradition. This is time spent with my grandfather, uncle, father, brother, etc. The deer hunt to me is simple and I don’t really have a need or desire to hunt deer outside of Utah (but I will reserve the right to change my mind).
Elk – If my wife told me that I could only do one hunt every year… without question it would be elk. I have hunted elk each year for the past 5 years and I have developed a passion (perhaps better defined as an obsession) for chasing these creatures. Elk brings a sense of satisfaction and accomplishment unlike anything I have ever experienced in the context of hunting.
Pronghorn – I think pronghorn has overtaken deer as number two on my list of favorites. This has been a recent addition to my annual list of tags… 2015 was my first try at pronghorn hunting and it’s become a family favorite. The hunts are easy enough for my young kids to go with me and the meat has been absolutely delicious (a pleasant surprise since opinions on pronghorn meat are varied).
Moose – I decided to begin applying for moose many years ago in the Utah once-in-a-lifetime (OIAL) drawing. I’ve got a handful of points and don’t really have much of a desire to hunt any of the other OIAL species.

How many tags can I reasonably expect to get each year? For many years I only got one tag, the general deer tag. Then I decided to try out elk hunting and for a couple years and had two tags. I then began to get an occasional cow elk tag and every so often had three tags. With the addition of two doe/fawn pronghorn tags I have had five tags each of the last two years.
Five tags has been a lot, and if each tag had its own season I’m sure it would never work out. But I have been able to take advantage of some overlapping dates in the same area for deer and elk, and overlapping dates in the same area with bull and cow elk. This has made for some very fun “combo” deer hunts where I’m able to chase cow elk during the general muzzleloader deer hunt when the rut is usually going pretty hard, and has also made for some very flexible general elk hunts where I know I can shoot an elk regardless of what it is as long as I can get in range. The doe/fawn antelope tags are what I call “filler” tags. The drive to the area is short and I can usually work a half day and just head up for the afternoon & evening and be back home before it’s too late. I tend to just fit in this quick hunt where I can and when I feel like I just need a little break between the deer and elk hunts and when the kids have an open afternoon without soccer, piano, dance, etc.
The last two years have been lots of fun so my goal moving forward is to have a minimum of 5 tags every year (so long as I continue to have some overlapping seasons)… one deer, two elk, and two pronghorn with the possibility to have maybe one or two more depending upon how individual state drawings work out for me.

For tags that are issued through a drawing system, do I have contingency plans for years that I am unsuccessful in the drawings? This only matters if you are absolutely intent on hunting every year… if you are satisfied with only hunting on years that you are fortunate enough to draw then you can skip this part. But if you are like me and my hunting buddies, if we don’t draw we are looking for other options to still get out and have a good time.
For deer, I don’t have too many concerns in not drawing my first choice general buck deer tag in Utah. The unit that I have hunted since I was a kid is not what you would consider one of the more desirable general units and up until just a couple years ago there were always a good handful of leftover tags that could be purchased over the counter (OTC) later in the summer. In fact, with the new changes to the preference point drawing for general deer tags, I would venture to guess that fewer guys list this unit as one of their “other” choices this year and we end up seeing leftover tags for this unit. Since I have no reason to believe that I will not draw this tag on an annual basis I don’t have a contingency plan in place for deer.
For elk, I am currently applying in the Utah limited entry drawing for an elk tag. Obviously my first choice would be to draw this tag, but I have applied and been unsuccessful for a number of years now. My contingency plan has been and will continue to be to purchase a general bull elk tag when they are made available OTC later in the summer. I have several options for cow elk tags as well… the unit that I hunt for both general deer and general elk offers a good amount of tags through the antlerless drawing, but also offers antlerless control and private lands tags. My primary choice for antlerless is to get a tag through the drawing but in the event that I am unsuccessful there I can choose between the control tag option or the private lands tag option. Both of these options have advantages and disadvantages… the control tag allows me to hunt anywhere within the unit but the private lands tag restricts me to private land, the control tag limits the dates I can hunt to when I have an open buck or bull hunt also within the unit but the private lands tag goes from August to January. Each tag is flexible in different ways but also restricting in different ways… so it can be a tough decision. In the past I have elected to go with the control tag and I’ve been very happy with the experiences that I’ve had. Elk is the most complicated part of my long term plan with contingency plans for both bull and cow tags depending upon how the different drawings work out.
For pronghorn, like deer, I don’t have a contingency plan in place. I will continue for the next couple years to purchase preference points for Wyoming buck pronghorn and Utah doe pronghorn. I have done a considerable amount of research with a friend and we have identified a couple different units in Wyoming where tags could be drawn with about 3 preference points. The doe/fawn tags that I like to apply for in Wyoming are easily drawn and I expect to draw them annually for the foreseeable future. I’m not exactly sure when or where I will use my Utah preference points for doe pronghorn, I hadn’t seen a unit that really got my attention until earlier this year so I’ll monitor that particular unit for another year or two before deciding whether or not to jump in.
Now that we’ve answered those questions, we can begin to put everything together. The easiest thing for me was to simply put together a plan for one year that outlined what my plan for applying would look like with the contingency options… I call this my “Annual Application Strategy.” This was my strategy for 2017 year:

I have clearly outlined the limited entry, general, and antlerless hunts that I applied or will apply for as well as the two pronghorn preference points that I just plan on purchasing the preference point. So I applied this year for general buck deer, limited entry elk, and OIAL moose tags in the bucks/bulls drawing back in February. The results of the elk drawing will determine if I buy the OTC elk tag and then I can proceed with the antlerless application. I will also apply for doe/fawn in Wyoming after the Utah results are released simply because that application period is open for a little while longer. Let me make it clear that knowing when the application dates open and close and when results get posted should also play a key role in formulating your yearly application strategy. I know many guys who apply for elk in Wyoming and Utah… they apply first in Wyoming because that application period is very early and the results of that drawing are posted before the Utah application period closes so their results from Wyoming affect how they end up applying in Utah. Careful planning and coordinating in your strategy regarding the application dates and the dates that results are posted can be critical… especially if fortune curses you with two tags in two states with the same dates and you have to surrender one of them because you can’t do both.
It would seem simple enough to take that “Annual Application Strategy” and extrapolate it across ten years… deer, elk, pronghorn, and moose applications. For those tags that I expect to get each year like the general buck deer and the doe/fawn pronghorn tags it can be just that simple, but for the limited entry permits that accumulate bonus or preference points it is more difficult. Much of the difficulty here lies in interpreting draw results from previous years, trends in growing application pools, possibly shrinking numbers of tags being offered, etc.
In a long term plan you are trying to take your strategy then match it up against all the application data and results to make an educated guess to somehow hopefully predict when you might draw that limited entry tag. To begin putting together my ten year plan I starting with my 2017 Application Strategy and began forecasting my expectations for 2018 and beyond. I made a grid and began to fill in and color coordinate the boxes… red for years when drawing the tag was not likely, yellow for years when I might have a reasonable chance to draw, and green for years when I expect to draw. I wanted to make sure I took a conservative stance, understanding that it would be better overestimate the number of points it would take for any given tag. In business there is a saying that goes, “it is better to under-promise and over-deliver than to over-promise and under-deliver” and it seems fitting to take a similar approach here. It would be infinitely easier to move my plans up in the event I draw a tag earlier than planned as opposed to have to push my plans back because I did not properly account for the “point creep” and had unrealistic expectations.
So let’s have a look at what I ended up with as my initial long term 10 year plan:

Through my research and based upon the units that I have identified as the ones I want to hunt I have predicted when I should draw the limited entry tags (elk and WY pronghorn) and I have color coordinated the boxes accordingly. I really like the long term visibility that I now have, especially with the color coordinating. One thing that I found to be very fortunate, in my conservative plan, was that as I build points for my limited entry and OIAL tags in Utah and also a buck pronghorn tag in Wyoming, I shouldn’t be in danger of overlapping quality tags (no yellow or green boxes overlap). Admittedly, my plan appears to be pretty generic compared to the detail of the Annual Application Strategy, and that is by design… I want my plan to be realistic but flexible. For example, what if I decide to pursue a Utah limited entry deer tag instead of a limited entry pronghorn tag after I draw my elk tag and begin the 5 year wait period? I want to be able to have that kind of flexibility in my plan and if that’s a change I do decide to make revise the grid accordingly. It should be noted that I also included my contingency plans for bull elk because I know that I will have to deal with a waiting period for elk at some point in time and the general elk hunt would then be my only option for bull elk during that period. I did not specifically include details on the antlerless elk contingency plan that I had mentioned earlier in an effort to not overcomplicate the grid diagram
As I shared a first draft of my plan with a friend his response was, “So when are you going to come to Idaho? I don’t see that in your plan.” I also have a friend in New Mexico that regularly invites me to join him in hunting his home state. The grid made it pretty clear to see when I could make a realistic case for going and hunting out of state with one of my friends… and I was surprised to see that depending upon how some of the drawings work out that the possibility of going with them might be easier than I had anticipated. New Mexico doesn’t provide me as much flexibility or predictability because of their random drawing system and their application period being earlier than Utah. The other caveat in New Mexico is that my friend takes advantage of the tags set aside for applicants that are under contract with a guide/outfitter service. Although I’m not thrilled at the prospect of utilizing a guide, he has developed a reasonable relationship with a particular guide service over the last couple years and the fees do appear to be on the lower end of the pricing spectrum so it’s not entirely out of the question. In order for New Mexico to work I would need to be pretty confident with my prediction of the Utah drawing results and be sure I can manage the additional financial burden of the guide service. Idaho gives me exceptional flexibility because the tags that we would get are OTC so I would have time to wait and see how the application periods play out.
The largest hurdle came after I had completed my 10 year plan and I realized that within the next couple of years I will begin to add my children to this plan. I have a ten year old son and in two years he wants to be able to start applying and getting tags for himself. In short succession I will also have a daughter and four other sons that will be added to this plan if the desire is there. As I began to think about adding each of them into my plan over the next ten years or so… honestly, I thought my head would explode. I could easily go broke financing all their tags so there will need to be compromise… I’ve toyed with a number of different options for what and how much I will pay for their tags.
There are a number of great opportunities for youth throughout the western states but one opportunity that I have decided I would like to do with them is a Wyoming buck pronghorn hunt. Pronghorn seems to be the least strenuous of the big game hunts available to me so it would be as easy as anything for young hunters and the cost of youth preference points and youth tags makes this an extremely viable option. As a bit of a side note to my 10 year plan I put together a separate plan outlining the timeline for each of my kids to draw a Wyoming buck pronghorn tag. I found that there would be a number of consecutive years where I could potentially be heading to Wyoming and at first blush the prospect of a nearly annual trip to Wyoming was exciting, but then I began to consider the logistics and costs associated with each of these trips (gas, motel, and food) as well as the time away and the other hunts that would likely need to be sacrificed to make such a plan work. As an alternative, I decided to look at clustering the kids together in pairs and taking two at a time. This actually appeared to work out very well and even allows me to take advantage of some of their preference points on a group application. I think this plan is workable and I’ll plan on taking my kids on a Wyoming buck pronghorn adventure two at a time every three or four years. I finally arrived at this plan.

That led me to refining my own plan and merging this Wyoming pronghorn plan with my long term plan. I also identified the years that I might be able to plan on hunting in either ID or NM, and I added a column the makes it easy for me to track the bonus and preference points as I accumulate them over the years. Just to make it clear, the numbers in that column are the point totals I have/will have at the time of application each year. My overall plan was modified and my final long term “10 year plan” looks something like this:

The key with having a plan is the ability to be flexible and adjust, you never know when you may discover another opportunity or are fortunate to beat the odds of drawing a random tag or something. You also never know what future management plans and herd conditions will be. As with all things you need to reserve the right to make changes how you see fit… I would bet that in ten years when I look back at the plan that I composed today that it will not look identical but hopefully it was reasonable enough that it at least appears similar.

All the images in this post were generated using an online concept mapping program called LucidChart.

2017 Application

On the eve of the Utah bucks, bulls, and once-in-a-lifetime (OIAL) application period opening… here are a few things that you need to know going into the 2017 application period:

The biggest change this year is in regards to how the general buck deer drawing will be carried out. In previous years applicants who had the highest number of preference points had their applications considered in entirety before moving on to applicants who had fewer preference points. This caused some concern among sportsmen as an applicant with 2 preference points was drawing a permit as a second or third choice before an applicant with fewer points but listed it as a first choice. A movement was initiated to alter the system to consider all applicants first choice selections before considering second, third, and fourth choices. Beginning this year, all applicant’s first choice selections will be considered before moving on to second choices.

Additionally, in an effort to reduce the phenomenon often referred to as “point creep” the DWR also decided to make an additional change to the general buck deer preference point draw. In the past, an applicant who did not receive a permit for a first choice selection received a preference point for next year. This allowed fortunate hunters who drew on their second, third, fourth, or fifth choices to obtain a permit AND a preference point. It didn’t take long for a “loophole” to be discovered and a handful of applicants took advantage of this to hunt sought after units while also accumulating preference points. Take care this year… be smart with your general buck deer application and know that this year if you draw ANY general buck deer permit your preference points will be reset to zero.

The 2017 Big Game Application Guidebook has an article that clearly describes these changes (https://wildlife.utah.gov/guidebooks/2017_pdfs/2017_biggameapp.pdf).

There are a number of new limited entry and OIAL hunts available, study the hunt tables in the Application Guidebook to see if any of these new options would be viable for you.

Completely up to date spreadsheets are linked at the left of the page, just click the images. Best of luck to everyone and happy hunting!

2016 Cow Elk

November 26
Four thirty came really early, and I was definitely not ready for my alarm to go off. I staggered downstairs and dressed quickly then sat and waited for Brian and Drew to pull into my driveway. A couple minutes before 5, I received a text that they were on their way so I carried my things out to the porch and waited outside for them. We made the short drive up the canyon, meeting with Josh and Carsen at a gas station about halfway to our destination. As we began the drive up the dirt road the lack of snow at the lower elevations prompted us to drive past our planned starting point and head to higher elevations. Our starting point for this hunt would be the same as the muzzleloader elk hunt in early November.

Since our plans had changed our timing was off quite a bit, and we had to make an hour and twenty minute hike through an easement on private property to where we would be able to hunt. As we crested the northern rim of a large bowl we began to glass. It was 8:30am and I figured that we were too late and we would need to now be looking for elk that had bedded for the day. We began to work to the west along the rim of the bowl up towards the head of the bowl and right about when we reached the head of the bowl we glassed back to our southeast to see a string of 8 cow and calf elk working their way up along the bottom of the bowl. The elk were right where I figured they would be… but they were much later than I had anticipated. Here we thought we were late, but in fact we were early and the elk were late. If we had just stayed put where we initially crested over the ridge into the bowl we would have had long but manageable shots at the small herd. Instead, we were left to plan an attack on the herd as they worked up to the patch of pines that is a regular bedding location.

Josh and Carsen volunteered to gain elevation and get about even with the pines then work back to the east into the bedded elk while Brian, Drew, and I would drop down lower and head back to the north to potentially shorten the distance if the elk busted out of there and headed downhill.
We sat and watched Josh and Carsen close the gap on the cluster of pines and when they reached about 400 yards we were able to see some movement and could see one cow standing in the smallest of openings in the pines. Josh and Carsen got to about 150 yards and the elk moved out. They ran exactly where I thought they would and headed east along the ridge and across a rocky chute. A moose was in their path and 3 cows split from the herd and began to run straight downhill towards us. They were moving fast and covering ground quickly. The best shot we were presented was a 450 yard shot on a running elk… so no shots were fired.
We continued to work around and try to determine where the 3 cows went. We searched for a while to see if we could find their tracks but they must have made a change in direction or went over a small ridge where the snow had already melted. We ended up spotting three cows bedded a long ways off on the opposite side of the canyon ¾ of a mile to a mile away and there was some dispute as to whether these were the same cows… we’ll never know.
Early in the afternoon we decided to head back to the truck and try the spot that I had originally planned near the power lines. We didn’t see anything in the early evening light and the younger boys were ready to call it a day so we headed for home.

This was the third time that I have hunted that bowl and had bedded elk use that same escape route. I’ve got to come up with a strategy to put somebody in a spot to take advantage of that escape route. There are a handful of challenges that I’ll need to address. The first challenge is timing. For me to get to the ambush spot I will need to cross the path that the elk will inevitably take to get to the beds. I can’t hike up to the spot early because I could spook the elk before they even get to their beds, so I essentially have to wait until they pass me then circle back behind them and get myself into position. I should be able to take advantage of this by setting up early in a spot advantageous to me as they file on past up to the bedding area and if no good shot presents itself to just let them file on by. Then I could circle back behind them and hike up to where I should be able intercept them if they get pushed from the bedding area. The second challenge however is the wind. In this area there always seems to be a prevailing breeze or wind from the south. This escape route is in the southeasterly direction so I would need to position myself so that my scent does not get carried into the bedding area to begin with. If I can figure out how to best position myself along that escape route I should be able to fill a tag there pretty easily… but I will probably need to be pretty creative to accomplish this with a muzzleloader on the bull elk hunt.

December 27
Four thirty again came early and I dressed again in the kitchen. Hopping in my car I headed to the designated meeting point to meet up with my friend Doug who was in town from Idaho and was willing to accompany me for the day. We arrived at the parking lot of the WMA about 30 minutes before I had planned so we had some time to sit and contemplate our plan of attack in the dark. After the series of snow storms that had plowed through the valley over Christmas I was worried that hiking would be strenuous, however I found that there was no more snow at the parking lot there than piled up on my front lawn. Doug left the strategy to me and said he would follow my lead wherever I went. My plan was to begin hiking about an hour before legal shooting light and get on a ridge overlooking a saddle to our south, a large bowl to our east, and a large sagebrush flat that stretches up onto the main face to the west. We attained the ridge just shortly after legal shooting light and began to glass. We saw a staggering number of deer, and a small handful of bucks that were some of the biggest I have personally laid eyes on in the field. We glassed a couple of bulls out in the sagebrush flats and a small herd of cows just across the private/public boundary. A hail of gunfire erupted from the direction of the parking lot, from my recollection I would estimate 8 to 10 shots maybe. That got things moving as strings of deer began running from that direction, and with all the movement it was tough to keep track of where everything was going. Just below us three elk rounded the hill and made their way at a trot into the trees just south of the saddle. When they reached the trees they slowed to a fast walk and by the time they had made their way through the trees and to the saddle they had slowed to a normal walk. Doug was talking in my ear the whole time telling me this was going to be easy and to wait. The elk were clearly preoccupied with the commotion below them and had no sense of any danger lurking above them, so I seized the opportunity to get even closer and shuffled my way to a cluster of rocks… I had my eye on one particular rock that appeared to be an ideal rest. I reached the rock about the same time the three elk reached the saddle and as they began to cross the saddle they stopped and grouped up. I was perched on the rock a mere 70 yards away from the small herd ready to take the first good shot offered me, the three elk all appeared to be the same size and all appeared young so I really had no preference. One cow stepped clear enough that I felt comfortable with the shot and fired. I saw the impact in the scope and almost immediately heard the “whomp” of the bullet hitting flesh. The other two elk just stood there for a second with their companion lying in the snow. I stood from behind the rock and they ran. I sent my wife a text at 7:57am letting her know that I had shot one… her response was, “Nice! So you’ll be home before lunch?”


I wanted to maximize the meat from this small cow so I decided to try and drag her out whole. Doug helped me get her gutted and we took stock of our gear before heading back towards the parking lot. I realized that I had left a glove back up at the rock cluster, so I returned to retrieve it. Then I realized I was missing a ski pole, so I returned again to the rock pile to retrieve it… I had stuff scattered all over that mountainside, it’s funny the way that happens when you have a surprise encounter with the quarry you’re after and you’re so focused on making sure you get a good shot.
Doug had started dragging the elk down towards the parking lot while I had returned for my ski pole, and he was making darn good time and was having an easy go of it because it was entirely downhill. There were spots where the elk would get going just a little too fast down the slope and he’d have to put the brakes on her to slow her down a bit. Even dragging the elk, we made it down off the mountain in about 15 minutes.
At the parking lot, we threw her onto the tailgate of the truck and skinned and quartered her there. It was like having her up on a nice little workbench! By 10:30am we were headed home and I’ll be working on the final butchering here over the next couple days.

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2016 Wyoming Doe/Fawn Pronghorn - Part 2

November 14, 2016
With one tag remaining in my pocket I knew that I had to make good on a promise that I had made to my daughter after leaving her in school and taking my oldest three boys back in October. I also knew that I just could not leave my two year old son at home again… he sobbed uncontrollably when I left him home with mom on that first trip. So, with permission from my daughter, I strapped a two year old in the carseat, plugged in the tablets, and we pointed the car to the east for the hour drive to the ranch where permission had been granted to shoot doe pronghorn.
The drive was smooth and since it was naptime my son slept most of the way. This was the quietest he would be for the remainder of the trip!

I pulled off the Interstate and after a short drive down the dirt road I pulled off to the side to prep my rifle, get out my binoculars, and get my sweater on. We drove along the road slowly stopping occasionally to glass the sagebrush terraces. In the previous trip with just the boys pronghorn were everywhere… such would not be the case this trip. What we lacked in pronghorn we more than made up for in mule deer. There were clusters of deer around every bend, and where there was a group of a half dozen or more does there was a great buck. We saw some fantastic bucks and I would conservatively estimate 18 to 20 bucks that were 4pt or better… a number of them had inline 5th or 6th points and were heavy and dark antlered. Beautiful creatures for certain, and we watched as these bucks paid little attention to my little silver car on the road just yards away as they focused intently on does. We watched two very nice 4pt bucks go toe to toe over a group of 8 or 9 does at about 30 yards, and watched a very nice 3pt buck corner a doe against a fence and rough her up a bit. Poor doe trotted away from that encounter with her hair all ruffled up and it didn’t even occur to me that an eight year old little girl in the front seat next to me might have some questions about what that boy deer was trying to do to that girl deer… in typical dad response I told her to “ask her mother.”

We drove from one end of the ranch all the way to the other without a single pronghorn sighting. I couldn’t figure it out… just four weeks ago there were pronghorn everywhere. And a friend of mine with the same tag went to the same ranch just three days before and shot a doe early in the afternoon. But today, on this afternoon, it was a ghost town. We turned the car around and traced our path back and made it almost all the way back to where we started before I spotted a small herd of pronghorn bedded up on one of the sage terraces, 3 bucks and 2 doe. I let the kids know that I had spotted some but we would have to hike for them. I received no resistance to the suggestion so we found a spot to park the car, got our coats & orange hats and off we went. We crossed a small stream and made our way towards the terrace edge. The small herd was actually in a highly advantageous place for a stalk. The challenge was not the location of the herd… instead it was my entourage! I wish I could have witnessed that stalk from a distance. I decided that there was little sense in trying to be stealthy about this all… so I just walked in plain view of the herd with my son on my shoulders and holding my daughters hand along a barbed-wire fence until we hit about 300 yards. I told them to sit down on a small hill and plug their ears and I walked another 15 yards away from them, rested my gun on the barbed wire fence and promptly missed twice. To perform my due diligence, we slinked under the barbed wire fence, and again with my son on my shoulders and holding my daughters hand we went to just double check where the herd had been when I shot. No blood was found much to the disdain of my daughter, and we continued up until we reached the ridge and peeked over into the next valley. I scanned for brief moment but saw no pronghorn. We turned and as we made our way back to the car I spotted a mule deer shed in a clump of sage about twenty yards in front of me. I took my son off my shoulders and when we got right up to it I asked if there was something wrong with that bush? Both my daughter and son thought it was the coolest thing and they wrestled with it to get it untangled from the clump of sage. Pictures were taken and it was stuffed in my pack to be shown to mom at a later time.

They wanted to look for more sheds so I threw my son back on my shoulders and we just kind of wandered through the sage terrace until it started to get dark and they wanted to head back towards the car. On the way back to the car the sage flats came to life with bunnies scurrying about everywhere. My son had the perfect vantage point from my shoulders and whenever he would spot one running along in front of us he would squeal and point and yell, “Bunny!!!”
We got back to the car right at dark. We got buckled back into the car and headed home… but not without stopping first at the Wendy’s in Evanston for a hamburger and Frosty.

All in all, I think both my daughter and son both had fun, the sum of the parts was greater than the whole with this adventure. Even though they were disappointed that I missed and we didn’t get another pronghorn they loved the little aspects of the journey… driving down a dirt road with their heads out the rolled down windows yelling “Hello deer!” to every cluster of deer, eating an entire bag of jerky, going to Wyoming for the first time, finding the shed antler, seeing all the bunny rabbits, and telling mom all about it when we got home. Most times I hunt so hard with the intent of killing an animal and bringing home the meat that I overlook some of these simple things, this hunt reinforced to me that it’s not the kill that makes success. I had so much fun with my daughter and my young son, I hope the memories of this afternoon and evening are as fond for them.

Utah General Muzzleloader Elk

Brian met me at my house at about 3:30pm and we made the short drive up the canyon to the family cabin. We unloaded quickly, turned on the utilities, made a quick fire in the fireplace, and headed up to the top of the mountain to glass in the last remaining light.
With no animals spotted after about an hour we returned to the cabin and finished getting our personal gear squared away.
Opening morning came quickly and as we were preparing our gear for the day I noticed brake lights just outside the window. Jared had arrived early, I wasn’t expecting him until later that day. We piled into Brian’s truck for the short drive to where we would begin our hunt. I hopped out of the truck, set up my tripod, snapped my binoculars into the harness, and immediately spotted a large herd of elk. The elk were on the move feeding up the ridge to the west across the canyon about a mile away… and we were on the move too. We made a brutal 1.5 mile hike (800ft loss in elevation in the first ¾ mile then gained it all back and then some in the next ¾ mile) to try and get above them but were too late.

We began to make our way along the northern edge of a large bowl and as I slipped into a large stand of pines I was met with a mass of tan bodies erupting from cover. I could hear the group heading north onto private property so I just waited and watched. Soon the string of elk began to file through a small opening. I raised my binoculars fully expecting to see the string of 30 or so cows that we had spotted earlier… instead my eyes beheld bull after bull after bull walk through that small opening. Ranging from spike to nice mature 6x6 bulls, I watched twenty plus bulls walk through that opening. I was stunned… and upset that I had been so close yet unable to do anything about it because of the recent boundary changes that now made where those elk were at off limits to me. In previous years I would have fired without hesitation because that was land I could hunt… now the majority shareholder of the property had roped off “his” portion and made it inaccessible.
For the rest of the day we hiked around and didn’t see much else.

On the hike back out Brian’s knee locked up and he dislocated his knee cap. It was pretty painful and he struggled on the climb back up to the truck.

The second morning I met Jesse at the gate early and by the time we got back to the cabin Jared and Brian were just waking up. We had a tough decision to make with Brian feeling unable to do much hiking. We decided that Brian would stay behind and take it easy that day while Jesse, Jared, and I worked around the area that we hunted the day before. We all drove up to the top again and I immediately spotted what appeared to be the same herd of cows and calves so we again headed off on the 1.5 mile hike down and back up the opposite hillside. This morning was different however, the herd had worked into a north facing hillside that we could glass readily and bedded there.

Jesse and I left Jared there on the north edge of the bowl and began working our way towards a bedded bull and two bedded cows that we were in advantageous positions for us to possibly get a shot. We worked towards the bedded elk and shortly before we got to our desired final destination I watched the bull stand and walk across the face of the hillside just beyond our comfortable muzzleloader range. We continued on to where we wanted to stop and sat for a while because I had not seen either of the two cows move with the bull. We waited there until late in the afternoon and watched deer and moose working through the area the entire time. The deer were beginning to rut pretty hard and every group of does was being monitored by at least one buck. We worked our way back out of the bowl and met up with Jared before hiking back to the truck. Jared and Brian decided to call it a hunt and headed for home.
Jesse and I woke the next morning bright and early and began hiking well before first light. We still did not arrive at the north edge of the bowl until after sun-up. We were hoping to arrive early enough to potentially cut the herd off before they reached their bedding area but the elk were not there that morning. We sat and glassed for several minutes before I spotted a lone cow in some deep shadows down in the bottom of the bowl. The race was on and we took different routes towards the cow. Jesse would take a direct line assault while I would circle to the east and head for a large rock outcropping. If she worked her way directly up the hill in front of us Jesse would get a shot but if she turned and tried to escape down the bottom of the bowl then I would be in a prime position for a shot. As I neared the rock outcropping I spotted the cow working her way up the hill across from me. I steadied on her and waited for her to turn broadside. As soon as she turned I fired and a cloud of smoke completely obscured my view for several seconds. She remained standing and continued to work her way up the hill. I ran closer to where she was and tried to get a second shot but she never presented a good shot. It took Jesse several minutes to get to where I was and after we met back up I decided to try to follow her trail. I could easily tell where she went because of her fresh prints in the snow so I followed them for several yards up the mountain. After weaving through some buck brush and ducking under a couple aspen limbs I heard crashing above me. I looked up just in time to see her bolt out from underneath a cluster of pines never giving me much of a chance for a shot. I looped my way west then north along the edge of the bowl and spent the afternoon cat napping in the sun. More deer were spotted in the afternoon and evening along with a few more moose, but no more elk.

My cow elk tag will open shortly in this same area, and I have been unable to make good on two opportunities to fill that tag already. I’m optimistic that I will be able to fill it during the normal season dates for that tag with my rifle.