Day 5 - This day we traveled again to the famous ridge I had become to charish so early in the hunt. We again got into a buglin' frenzy and were able to get pretty close to elk, but nothing I wanted. I had a good 6 point bull at a distance of 34 yards, but he was a little weak in the fronts and back, and with what I had seen the previous day, decided that I would pass. During the late morning break I joked with Keith about how I like to "Fire up the Band" when I call. He said lets hear it....as I pulled out every call I had we laughed and joked after my 4 minute musical, grabbed our packs and headed on our journey to find some more bulls. We took 5 steps to see this small rag horn 5 point on a dead run to our spot !! He wanted a front row seat to what he heard, but didn't like what he saw. This day was a good day as I finished my evening hunting at the waterhole the elk of the area use and the one Terry was successful on the previous week.


DAY 6 - Again we awoke about 4:45pm, this time the only difference was the alarm was that a very close elk outside my tent. As I left the tent and met with Keith I almost thought I was dreaming until he confirmed my alarm. This morning we decided to head the other direction as the elk appeared more vocal in an area we left untouched. We made our hike out and down the ridge only to pause so to pin point the location of what was a distant bugle. Keith had believed the source was located not far from a wallow that he had mentioned had been used heavily earlier in the season. It wasn't long until the bugle identified the bull's location and it was closer than we had thought. As we slowly crept around the juniper bushes the bull was spotted in a small park feeding all alone. Perfect, as we had time to glass this bull and check the wind, his 6 point frame would put him in the 320 class and decided this was a bull worth setting up for. It seemed so perfect, so my hunting partner and I split up on this ridge for what we thought would be the perfect ambush. This turned out to be a mistake. Keith made two perfect cow calls and this bull fired back immediately, picked up his head and on his way he came. As he approached the 100 yard mark, I felt the wind hit me in the neck which put my hunting partners scent directly in the path of the approaching bull. All was silent. With my location about 40 yards to the left of the approach, I crept down the ridge about 10 yards for a better vantage point to see the bull frozen in his tracks looking in the direction of where my friend's hidden location. It didn't take long for this bull to decide that so far in his life his nose has never let him down. He turned and left the direction he came and disappeared in the junipers....so close. Not to long after this awesome encounter did it take for us to spot another bull, an awesome bull that we thought would in the 340 area, however with his cows present, it became quite the task to even get close. The terrain, the location and mutiple guards has this bull protected until another day.

I will conclude that we were in bulls everyday and I saw a total of 11 bulls, of which 5 would score over 300, 2 of which pushed the 340 number. I can't recall the total elk I had seen, but I can say that every morning and evening it was action and we saw elk !!! My hunting partner and I made some mistakes in learning these aggressive "new to me" elk hunting techinques. As I concluded my 32 hour drive back to Pennsylvania two things crossed my mind. One was the immediate friendship that we made with Keith along his abilities in pursing elk. Second, I look forward to the day in which I can again venture back into the Gila Wilderness Area to pursue my pursuit of the rutting bull elk. Until then, if you are at the Harrisburg Show in February 2010 please stop by and tell my friends Keith and Barbara White hello.......its amazing what friendships can be established at elk camp.

A Shed that was found...wonder how big he is this year.


Listening from a Ridge


Keith & D. Cooper checking out a wallow


A Sunset in the Gila, only if I could have captured the sound in the background