gselkhunter

Justhuntitall, An important issue, the cow makes the choice of what bull will breed her. She doesn't do this by the sound of his bugle, but by seeing him. The bugle is a clue to his size for her. There are three basic bugles, locational, courtship, and threatening. Elknut1 is using a style that starts as enticement with a hot cow, good plan it works well. Then telling the bull, no you don't that's my cow and a fight mode starts, also works good. If needed I will go to the next step, I will call so big, pants, high pitch to a buzz bugle and major grunts, all the time breaking everything is sight and call the old boys cows away from him. When he shows up his eyes are so red with anger you have to shoot him in self defense. You hunt with a group so you have an another option. Have a guy stay back and bugle at the bull. Make sure you cut him off in the middle of his bugle, it shows him no respect, he won't like that. Then have the shooter run up and split the difference of the bugles and pleade with the old boy to come and save you from this up start, remember he isn't thinking with his brain. There are some really good tapes and books out there. As for calls I use, Hunter's Specialties 3.5 reed bull elk, they don't make these anymore[:@] , 2 or 3 reed High plains call. For cow calls done on an external I have 2 Primos calls and 1 Carlton, the old one you can't get any more[:@]. Give you an idea of how much practice I did to get to this level, 3 /4 hours every night for 10 yrs. I called on Hunter's Specialties pro staff for 10 yrs. I won a few Colorado & Colorado Bowhunters Assoc. titles along the way. In other words I worked hard at it. If a Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation shindig comes around your way go watch the calling competition, I called in a few of those too, learned a lot. And by listening to a lot of elk and making a lot of mistakes in the field, I now have a pretty good feel of what is happening in a situation in the field. Hope this helps. My best book "Elk of North America" is a management and biology book, great tool!
Gselkhunter