Hoss50

Be prepared to be cold. Stay warm. Hunt hard and shoot straight. 7e is a tough unit on late hunts. Start in the middle and look for sign. If you dont see sign, move, and dont be afraid to make drastic moves. Get away from the roads and glass, glass, glass.

Magnum bolt face I assume?

I only got to size 13, sorry.

If you have them bring them. Some of those roads can be nasty when muddy.

SxS for sure. With as much rain as we just got plus the rain they are saying might happen next week it could be a muddy mess.

OnX kicks butt. I wasn't sold on it until I gave it a try and used it this elk season. It is super useful, and it is nice to be able to text a waypoint to your buddy when you need to. It is accurate too. If you move even a couple feet it will pick it up and move you on your map.

We have fun shooting at the 200 yard steel with pistols sometimes, and if you are acting as a spotter with binoculars you can see the bullets flying through the air before they hit the steel. The big slower calibers like 45LC are the best.

Today was a good day. Miller's brought our elk to the westside dropoff location, and I earned my blue belt in my jiu jitsu class.

My best buddy and I drew cow tags this year for an October hunt, and we were very excited to have the opportunity to try and put some meat in the freezer. We enlisted the help of a good buddy who knew our area well. He wasn't able to get up til Friday at about 3pm. We arrived in the area on Thursdays, set camp, and went for a scout. During our scout my buddy ran into a decent bull, and we could hear bulls bulging in the valley of the ridges we were over watching. I went on the scout with my hunting pack, but only had on my street clothes and arms because I wasn't hunting. I was glassing a clearing, and went to mark it on my OnX. As I look up and start to mark it I glanced up and saw this gem. I didn't think about this kind of situation, so the only gun I have with me is my 9mm Sig inside my waistband, under my shirt, and tucked nicely beneath my back's belt... I did get it out in record time though despite the "deep cover" carry spot. Friday morning we arrived in our spot and hiked in before dawn. We were setup over looking different parts of the same valley. We had put to bed a couple bulls in that valley the night before, and at first light they started up again yelling at each other. I butted in and started bugling back and forth and got them all fired up. It was pretty awesome. I got one bull to close from about 800 yards to 400 yards, but he never broke out of the timber. I spotted 1 elk in the valley that we thought was a cow so we decided to try and punch into the valley from the opposite side. That was a mistake. The thickets between the road and the meadow was NASTY. We paid the price for that one, and went back to camp and regrouped. We picked up our buddy who came to help and he got us setup on a meadow he knows and told us we were going to get a double. I thought it was crazy. We setup and glassed the valley. We watched quite a few deer move around, and about 4:45pm a small 6x6 moved into the valley. We glassed him for about 25 minutes until 2 cows moved into the valley with him. Game Time... We get setup. My buddy and I are working trying to get setup on the 2 different cows, and they are being skiddish. They were moving around a lot and moving back and forth near the bull which blocked many shots. I knew we wouldn't get a 1,2,3 shoot double so I told my buddy to take the shot when he got it. He had never gotten an elk before, so he had rights to the first shot. He took a shot...and missed... They spooked, but didn't run. They kept moving around and finally a cow presented another shot and he took it. It didn't go down so he shot again, and again. She finally went down. About that time my cow turned quartering away and I sent one. She jogged off and stumbled, and then went down. We pulled it off. We dropped a double. We were both shooting 6.5x55 rifles shooting my 135gr Berger Classic Hunters handloads. They did the job very well, and made a mess of the lungs on both elk. My buddies elk ended up taking 3 hits. A high neck shot, a shoulder shot, and a lung shot. She didn't go far. My shot was a clean double lung, and the lungs were shredded. The 6x6 bull took off running after the 2nd cow went down. He was not happy we shot his girlfriends. While I was getting the truck closer my two buddies said he ran back in on them bugling and pissed, then took off for good.

Today was a good day. The processor finished my elk, and I earned my blue belt in BJJ.

This is the deal I found for my Veracity. You can use the free second scope on another rifle, or sell it. https://www.opticsplanet.com/burris-veracity-3x-15x-50-free-fullfield-ii-3-9x42-riflescope.html

We did 7e twice in December in toyhaulers. First year was no water. 2nd year we did water, and used a roll of duct wrap insulation to skirt the bottom of the trailer. It was well below freezing and the insulation skirt kept the water from freezing.

If it doesn't get picked up let me know.

Get away from the roads, and dont believe that elk only live in pine forests. If it is cold, get into the junipers and nastiest canyon you can find.

Also a note for people running the heaters from a hose. If you can't get it to light you need to purge the air from the hose. That night when it was freakin cold I couldn't get the heater to light. After some attempts the pilot light would light, but when you turned the heater up it would flame out. Turns out it had air in the lines. I let the pilot light run for about 5 minutes, then turned it up, and it worked perfect.

They make 1 of the hoses that has a built in filter or screen. I keep the vents open and the bottom of the doors unzipped. I also keep a battery operated Carbon monoxide alarm in the tent. We have never had it alarm, even with 2 heater running when it was super cold out.

I spent a couple nights in my 10x14 flexblow north of Flagstaff in December. It was low temps in the 15* area, but windy. We had a single canister buddy heater running on high all night hooked to a BBQ tank, and another buddy heater on low running on green bottles. It wasn't cold in the tent, but it wasn't warm either. When the heater on low ran out a green cylinder you knew it, and would wake up to put a new one on. Our bags are probably +20* sleeping bags though so that doesn't help. If it hadn't been windy I think it would have been manageable with just the 1 heater on high on the BBQ tank. A big buddy dual cylinder heater hooked to a BBQ tank would probably rock it in one of those tents.

What is the reamer setup to set the overall cartridge length at? I need to see if it will fit in my magazine.

I dont go on a trip without each tagged hunter having a backup rifle they know how to shoot now. There is no reason not to if you have the hardware. I have only had 1 occasion to resort to a backup rifle, but last year it happened in Kaibab. My buddy needed it. He was carrying one of my rifles, and dropped my 257 weatherby on the scope, and had to resort to the 13lb 300 win mag. It was still better to carry that pig then have to drive back to PHX to get another rifle.

Look at Burris Veracity or the step above. I have two of the 3x15x50 veracity's and like them better than my Vortex 6x24x50 HS-LR. The Vortex is nice enough, but at 24x, it seems like the reticle get really light like an over exposed picture. I like the scope overall, but I like the Burris better.

Let me know how they act on an animal. If they kill well it just may be the info I need to push me over the edge and rebarrel my 257 weatherby to a fast twist to run the blackjacks...

Those are pretty big.

Dont overlook toyhaulers. I bought a 21' weekend warrior last year from a buddy. It is really nice to open the back door to load up trailer with totes and stuff. I even roll my traeger right in and secure it with the vehicle tie downs. I have 1 queen bed overhead, 2 twins on the sides, and a pop out queen in front. I love it. It is small enough to be easy to get into places, and with the pop out queen we can fit alot of people if necessary. It is easy to put a 3rd queen bed down with an air mattress in the toy box floor.

I will take the koa please.

I am going to test the scope and mounts soon. They are new, but I know I double checked and torqued them correctly, so unless the scope is the problem, it is probably the barrel.