this is chapter 1. luckys home
back in the early 90s my brother chris and I decided to try archery for elk.we had hunted archery for deer in the past but elk was a new experiance for us. on this hunt ,it was I who possesed the tag so he was my bugler and with a little (or a lot) of luck , my pack mule.
it was opening day late in august. we left the truck well before daylight and started up the ridge. it took us about an hour and a half to reach the top. when we arived it was just beginning to get light .so we set down to glass the surounding hillsfarther down the ridge we were on to our left I spotted several cow elk ,feeding their way down into the timber. when they disapeared we decided to throw out a bugle and see what happened. chris bugled and instantly we heard a deep throated response from a bull, probably about a half mile across the bowl below us . needless to say , it got our blood pumping. for those who have never heard a bull bugle ,it is something you must experiance.
we decided to try and work our way closer before we tried again. so we quietly worked our way down into the bowl, following a little finger ridge. when we got fairly close to where we figured he was , chris threw out another bugle. again an instant deep throated response. we waited a few minutes and chris tried a couple cow calls. nothing.
we gave it a bit more time and chris ,bugled again. once again instant response, but still quite a ways off and did not seem to be any closer. there was a fairly small hill between us , so we decided to try and slip over the top and setup to try again. it probably took us half an hour to cover a few hundred yards as we were taking it slow and quite, but eventually we got were we wanted to be and chris threw out another bugle. again instant response. we waited and again tried a cow call . nothing.
after a minute or two , chris again, threw out a bugle and once again instant reply. this time chris bugled again before lucky finished his own and cut him off. a few seconds went by and lucky bugled again, chris once again cut him off, hoping to piss him off. it seemed to work. the next time lucky bugled he was coming closer. we waited .chris tried another cow call and this time we heard branches snapping below us. he was inside of a hundred yards but we could see nothing.
lucky bugled , chris cut him off. chris bugled ,lucky cut him off. this went on for maybe close to an hour or so, but he would come no closer. eventually the day began heating up and lucky grew bored with us and headed off through the brush.we tried more bugles and cow calls for awhile but could get no response.we thought about trying to go after him but it was getting hot so we decided to pull out and try again the next weekend. we never did get a glimpse of him ,that day but still it was one of the greatest hunts I have been on.
the next weekend was pretty much a repeat of day on with the exception that we did finally catch a glimpse of him through the trees.but alas ,still no shot.
stay tuned for chapter two.
how lucky got his name