Redbeard

I believe that is the place that has been in some trouble with the law about pig/dog fighting in the past. I wouldn't touch it with a 10 ft. pole. BTW. Some of those animals have escaped in the past.

Amen Brotha!

This whole thing is horrible. Glad the GF is OK but get those kids away from that ex and sex offender. If that isn't grounds for you getting custody I don't know what is. Must be a CA court.

Bob, I figured you were just ribbing me. But even if you weren't you couldn't knock me off my cloud. Thanks for the compliment but I'm sure there are plenty of other guys out there hunting fair chase too. Hopefully these Wrongway guys were. Bring on Ocho!

No Jeff. I want them! Still available?

Well? Is it sold for sure? If not where are you located?

What is the fuel mileage on that rig?

Bob, I haven't been psyched about hunting in a while but something about the challenge of my hunt got me going again. Now that it is over you are right I'm still flyin' Not so much from the bull but just being "into" a hunting state of mind again. I love the elk pictures. This Wrongway bull is a dream! I love the bottom end. I'm thinking it ought to score closer to 420. The weird trashy bulls are cool too. Looks like this was the year to have a tag. So much for all the whining about it being a drought year. Please don't hate me... that was only my 4th tag in 11 years. Every one of those ended up on a bull. If you really just want an elk tag you can buy those in Colorado. Finding a bull to put them on is another story. Chris

I thought it was my body odor! So, now you are telling me I gotta have a team of guys AND a good tag to get a good bull?! Probably the next thing you will tell me is I need to give them all radios! Man, I'm doomed. I'll just have to keep shooting those dinks all by myself I guess.

Congrats on the huge beautiful bull guys! That one is as sweet as they get. So, now let me get this straight... if I want to kill a big bull I gotta have a team of guys helping me out. Dang! no wonder I can't get a decent bull.

NICE!

It will go into the book as long as it was submitted and approved to BIA not just P&Y.

Here are a couple pictures of my 2007 "limited opportunity" archery hunt bull. It was definitely very limited opportunity. This was the ONLY bull I saw in over 30 days of scouting. I did see two other bulls during the week of hunting and missed a shot at one of them. They were not bugling and had no cows. In fact the only cows (2) I saw were with this bull the morning I shot him. One evening about two weeks before the season opened I went to scout this area with my 9 year old daughter Zoe and called this bull in to 20 yards. We got a couple of minutes of video of him and after watching it 100 times I was hooked on trying to kill this bull. It was NOT a great spot for elk but once I knew this bull was there I kept going back. My main goal was not to have to deal with other hunters like I did last year in unit 8. I always say I'd rather hunt an area with fewer elk if it means fewer hunters. In pursuit of that goal I left no stone unturned. The only other hunter I saw during the hunt was a guy with a cow tag who just happened to randomly pick this spot on the map. It took a week of hard hunting but I finally caught up with my bull 6:30 Friday morning. I called him across a little valley and he came right to me just like in the movies. I kinda blew the 30 yard shot by not accounting for him walking. Hit him too far back so I left him all day to be sure he was down. Turns out he went half a mile and piled up probably 10 minutes after I shot him. Go figure. Last year I made a perfect shot and the bull made it about 10 hours. I started skinning and packing at 7 pm and since I was by myself and had to pack him off a small mountain (Six trips including the head and meat)I didn't get done until 12:30am. The butcher weighed in just under 400 pounds of meat! Sorry the pictures aren't great. It was tough to get good pictures by myself without a tripod and in a nasty juniper thicket. I can't get this thing to upload the pictures so I'll try a link. http://img217.imageshack.us/my.php?image=2007bull3xm1.jpg http://img215.imageshack.us/my.php?image=2007bull11tg4.jpg I'll let you guess the score. Chris

Just throw the tape out the window and shoot that one! Man that is cool! Good job!

I can personally vouch for the fact that Andy is a great shot with his longbow. Of course your big bull didn't prove that. 6 yards...gimme a break. Just stab it with the arrow next time. And yes Josh used to beat some of us shooting a barebow Oneida at the 3-D's. You know I can do it if I disengage the brain. Remember that bobcat I smoked that time with the longbow?

That is one of the most unique racks I've ever seen. Cool!

Just finished doing a more careful measurement. Came up with 371 5/8 gross. He ought to net about 364 or so depending on shrinkage and measurers judgments.

Hey Josh, Take it easy. Like I said I never claimed to be a better shot than you. You started this when you called me a "doofus" and said I should go back to rifle hunting because I missed a shot. That wasn't very nice. I fully admitted to making a bad shot on my bull this year but it turned out to be better than it looked and I did what it took to recover that bull. Next year I'm going back to longbows I think. Too many gadgets and thinking go into the wheelbow. Seriously man, I'm honestly sorry if my comments messed up your "vibe" on this thread but as any kid would say, "You started it." And that's enough of this "shooting skills" BS... Just enjoy your success. Congrats again. I still think your bull is absolutely beautiful. cjd

He who is without sin may cast the first stone. You asked for it. How quickly we forget. Remember that time I was guiding those guys in 33 on a rifle coues hunt and we heard this guy shoot TEN times! Turns out it was you! I videoed you missing your first coues deer with a bow at 25 yards. Remember you hit and lost two bulls on your unit 8 hunt in the mid 90's. I know there must have been some other misses I forgot about. You said yourself your form is so bad you can't shoot fixed blade broadheads. Like I said you don't want me to get started on your shooting skills. I'm not saying I'm any better but you took the first shot at me in this thread. One thing I know for sure is that Janice (my wife) is a better shot with a gun than both of us. She has three big animals and all were dumped with one shot.

Andy, I have never seen a bear with a head so over inflated. That thing looks freekish! Are you sure that isn't you after being told you are the camera guru?

Thanks guys. I'm still figuring out what happened to me on this hunt. I haven't been so mentally and emotionally involved in scouting and hunting since my first big bull back in 1997. It sure is nice to get the "killer instinct" back but as I wind down from this hunt I realize how possessed I had become. This hunt means a lot to me since I got that drive back. I think Andy knows what I'm trying to say. About the score...When I first videoed the bull I thought 360. After I looked at it on the TV with a buddy, Clark, and my 390 bull in the same room to compare it to he was convinced it was at least 380 and I was thinking 350! Some bulls are just perfectly proportioned to look huge but are just built on a smaller frame. When I first saw the nontypical bull I killed in 2001 I thought he was 400 but over the days of watching him I figured out he was one of those bulls. He ended up 375ish (An estimate because he broke a couple points right before I killed him. ) but I wasn't surprised. When I walked up to this bull on the ground I still thought 350. By the time I was done packing I thought 370. So, it is pretty deceiving. He has long thirds and a wider than it looks spread. The beams just keep opening up to the end but the points tip inwards. Scores are fun to talk about and throw around but I would have shot him and been just as happy and proud if it were 320. It was a cool hunt. Clark wanted to bet me dinner that it would score over 380. I decided to give him a chance and agree to bet on 370. I told him I was going to kill that bull and hope he scored 369 7/8. I can't believe I actually killed him so we have a bet! I think he owes me dinner by an inch or so but I need to measure it again more carefully to be sure it doesn't break 370. I guess I wouldn't mind buying him dinner if it did.

That's the way to do it. Congrats!

DB, Exactly. For me it's canned chili mixed with minute rice for dinner, or a few spoonfuls of Safeway potato salad if I'm too tired. Frosted miniwheats or poptarts for breakfast. Drive to new spots at night. Hike in the dark sleep next to the truck or wherever I'm gonna hunt in the morning so I don't have to drive anywhere. When you wake up quietly and in the woods with the animals you become part of the system. It does get lonely, so I love my XM radio. Some people are afraid of the dark. Especially when they are alone. I got over that a long time ago. I might be 2-5 miles from camp or my truck when it gets dark. I remember Andy asking me one time, "Do you ever hike out in the light?" If you want to hunt primetime you need to get used to hiking in the dark. GPS sure helps for this. My biggest fault as a hunter is that I am not a morning person. The only time I willingly wakeup with a time starting with a number less than 5 is while I'm hunting. It is just as well that I am alone then. cjd

That wore you out!? It was only half a mile and we had help so only had to make one trip. Sure it was half a mile straight up fighting through brush and it was 95 degrees and we were out of water but jeeze! Come to think of it, that did suck. Thanks for the help. I actually kind of enjoyed packing this one. It was dark, raining a little, and the woods were silent. All that existed was what I could see within the little spot of light thrown by my headlamp. The world was very small and my life was very simple for a few hours. No more trying to figure out where and how to hunt tomorrow. For the last two months I had spent almost every spare moment scouting or thinking about this hunt, trying to figure out these units and the nomadic elk that seemed like ghosts that just left tracks. Now I had nothing to figure out, nowhere to be and was in no hurry. I had my bull and everything had worked out like a dreamed it might. There was nothing to do but work and reflect on my hunt. I was just in a trance. It kinda reminded me of when I was rock climbing all night on El Capitan in Yosemite a long time ago. I was a couple thousand feet off the ground but it just didn't feel like it cause all I could see was the rock right in front of me. It was very calming. This time I just put my head down and kept doing laps until it was all at the truck. It was kinda weird stumbling back up that hill trying to find the same route I took the last time but eventully I'd see the little flashing light I left in a tree near the bull, load up again and stumble back down. I also had a lantern going at the truck so I could find it and every time I got down with a load there was that rack glowing in the light. I'd move the lantern to a different spot each time so I could see the rack in a different way on the next trip. Every time I dropped off a load it looked better. However every time I passed one particular dirt spot I'd see my bulls tracks mixed in with some cow tracks and it made me really sad. His life had been pretty good that morning. Being alone you get to think about stuff like that. It ain't all about scores and trophy photos. I have done a lot of hunting and scouting alone and it is a very different experience than hunting with friends. Everybody should try it sometime. I really like the freedom and focus I get hunting alone but it isn't as much "fun" as hunting with others. Someimes it isn't "fun" at all. Packing out a big bull alone in the dark is really different but very rewarding (when it's over.) I get some kind of satisfaction from all of it. I guess I feel like I have to suffer a little to deserve to take an animal. Packing it out is just paying my dues and putting some closure on the whole ordeal. Kinda twisted I guess. When I was driving home I thought, "Next year I'm just going to put in for a bonus point. I just don't need to keep working so hard scouting, hunting, and packing." It can be like an addiction for me. One old old friend of mine says, "You can turn anything into work." He understands because he was raised by a Dad just like mine who forcefully instilled a work ethic into each of us. I continued thinking, "I have nothing to prove to myself or anybody. Why do I keep doing this?" Even Janice is bugging me to stop. She says to just kill a young cow. Phoebe (age six) keeps asking me, "Daddy where are you going to put this one?" Then Sat. a new friend named Clint says, "Well, lets see you've killed big bulls with rifle, muzzleloader, and bow. I guess you have to do it with your longbow next time." Suddenly I feel like elk hunting again next year. It's all about the challenge to me. There is so much more to be gained from hunting than most of us take advantage of. Of course I missed out on the part about time with friends on this hunt. Sorry about getting all philosophical here but I'm still high from my hunt....

Yeah Andy, last year you ran my bull off so you wouldn't have to help pack him out.