Yes but then you couldn't brag about shooting a 350" unless you applied some measuring tape magic (an all too common event). Of course all TV bulls are 350" class bulls, or better. I am always impressed by the TV boys that can glass an elk at 1,500 yards and know exactly what he will score.

All hard earned elk are trophies in my book.

That math is real simple, but finding and shooting a 350" compared to a 325" are two different things! Heck, IMHO a 300" bull is one heck of a trophy.

Ha! Ain't that the truth... Don't get me going Hunting Shows on TV!!! That's a topic for a whole different discussion!

I agree, though...put a 325" bull next to a 350" bull at 1,500 yards and it would take a pretty experienced elk hunter to be able to see those 2" differences in the measurements. Take scoring with a grain of salt. It's really not what it's all about at all.....

Back to the original question here. I've only hunted Montana, so all I know about other states is what I've read. If a person can draw a permit in any state where tags are limited they're going to have a much better chance at a nice bull... Might take a while to draw one of those tags, but the wait is usually worth it. In the meantime if a person has $10,000 to spend I think I'd be looking at any outfitter who has a good size piece of private ground to hunt...

your definitely going to want to go private were they have very little to no pressure. A large land owner in great elk country. There are nice bulls on public but private can be a lot better where there are less hunters, pressure, and bulls have more time to mature. the scoring can be finicky

Just for the fun of it I'm going to put up a picture of a good bull that my buddy shot while I was with him on our Wyoming hunt in 2010. It's been officially scored, so let's see if you guys can say whether it's closer to 325" or 350". We'll give it a couple days and I'll come back on with the score on Friday.

OK...I'll play. I'm not much at guessing scores, but I'd say closer to 350, but a good photographer can make an animal look much larger than it really is....lots of tricks to the trade!!!

That's a nice 6 point Topgun, only elk hunted once, but he's a shooter for sure. I'd say 360 if I had to guess.

Well, we're running away with this guys post---
but I'm thinking 340 range ---very nice bull,
regardless of score.

To me it looks closer to 325 like 330-340, but could go either way.

Mass is decent. What is the key for me here is the length of tines they are longer than they appear and more uniform. I'm saying closer to 350 just because of the length of the tines.

Even took a guess at the length of tines and mass I'm putting 356 as a number for the heck of it.