Opportunity VS Trophy Hunts

[trphyhntr]

On 12/5/2022 at 10:27 AM, idgaf said:

It can be both. Give me a late season archery tag over a September archery tag any day.  

Did you kill any bulls on any of your late archery hunts 

[WHT_MTNMAN]

Thankfully I've had the opportunity to kill a decent bull on the late archery hunt, If I didn't have the chance to do other hunts throughout the year the late archery hunts can be fun. There are a few things I did not like about them.  After shooting a few elk over the years I don't have a need to shoot a cow elk so my response will be for bull. 

1. In most of the units it can be pretty cold. I killed a late archery bull at 0 degrees. Cold can be hard on archery equipment 

2. They get into the thick stuff pretty early and can be very tough middle of the day hunting. 

3. Expensive .. I always found myself sleeping in a hotel or something, I hate camping in - degrees, just not fun for me. 

4. Even the worst bull hunts are getting harder and harder to draw, there isn't much opportunity (hunting every year) anymore. 

 

To me I would rather spend my time off doing archery deer, or predator hunting or ducks or going out of state that spend a bunch of cold nights chasing raghorns on the late archery hunts.  That being said after I draw my next early tag I'm sure I'll be trying to hunt the late hunts just to hunt until I get too old to do so. 

 

 

[452b264]

When your hunting the late hunts its imperative to know the habits of the animal at that time of the year/season an example would be that they could care less about the cows. A bonus to the cold is you can hang your meat in a tree and its not going to spoil so you can come back the next day and finish packing your meat out, there are no meat bees or fly's to deal with either.

 Personally I like the late rifle hunts. The bull in my avatar was taken on a late hunt, I started scouting in September and he was always in this one drainage with two other bulls. 

[idgaf]

6 hours ago, trphyhntr said:

Did you kill any bulls on any of your late archery hunts 

Couple. One 300 ish and 1 320 ish. Passed up way more than I should, but I always do that. 

[UggRedBilly]

6 hours ago, WHT_MTNMAN said:

Thankfully I've had the opportunity to kill a decent bull on the late archery hunt, If I didn't have the chance to do other hunts throughout the year the late archery hunts can be fun. There are a few things I did not like about them.  After shooting a few elk over the years I don't have a need to shoot a cow elk so my response will be for bull. 

1. In most of the units it can be pretty cold. I killed a late archery bull at 0 degrees. Cold can be hard on archery equipment 

2. They get into the thick stuff pretty early and can be very tough middle of the day hunting. 

3. Expensive .. I always found myself sleeping in a hotel or something, I hate camping in - degrees, just not fun for me. 

4. Even the worst bull hunts are getting harder and harder to draw, there isn't much opportunity (hunting every year) anymore. 

 

To me I would rather spend my time off doing archery deer, or predator hunting or ducks or going out of state that spend a bunch of cold nights chasing raghorns on the late archery hunts.  That being said after I draw my next early tag I'm sure I'll be trying to hunt the late hunts just to hunt until I get too old to do so. 

 

 

Yeah I was thinking about using a hotel. I don't have good enough camping supplies to really keep me warm if an early front or storm came in. I have been doing research on some of the units. I just kinda figured that imma put in for some harder tags like early archery elk and the kaibab mule deer tags, while I wait imma use this year to start kinda doing photography so I can learn about these animals without hunting them. Maybe I'll get better at stalking them I'm the long run too. I'm about 5-7 years away from the unit I wanna hunt. So I figured I'll learn a lot in that time

[UggRedBilly]

5 hours ago, 452b264 said:

When your hunting the late hunts its imperative to know the habits of the animal at that time of the year/season an example would be that they could care less about the cows. A bonus to the cold is you can hang your meat in a tree and its not going to spoil so you can come back the next day and finish packing your meat out, there are no meat bees or fly's to deal with either.

 Personally I like the late rifle hunts. The bull in my avatar was taken on a late hunt, I started scouting in September and he was always in this one drainage with two other bulls. 

That's sick man. I was looking into those but for now I don't feel too comfortable hunting that late due too the snow. I still have my little 2wd ranger. Maybe it'll get me on the main roads but sometimes the snow can get rough really fast. I'd hate to be stuck out there after a storm goes in. I have been saving for like an XJ or a 3rd Gen 4runner. After that I would like to start doing those late rifle tags. Odds seem to be a bit better!

[SunDevil]

1 hour ago, UggRedBilly said:

Yeah I was thinking about using a hotel. I don't have good enough camping supplies to really keep me warm if an early front or storm came in. I have been doing research on some of the units. I just kinda figured that imma put in for some harder tags like early archery elk and the kaibab mule deer tags, while I wait imma use this year to start kinda doing photography so I can learn about these animals without hunting them. Maybe I'll get better at stalking them I'm the long run too. I'm about 5-7 years away from the unit I wanna hunt. So I figured I'll learn a lot in that time

Best time to photograph bull elk is during the month of September. Good luck!

[UggRedBilly]

6 hours ago, SunDevil said:

Best time to photograph bull elk is during the month of September. Good luck!

That's the plan! Thank you!

[metau]

On 12/21/2022 at 9:05 PM, UggRedBilly said:

Yeah I was thinking about using a hotel. I don't have good enough camping supplies to really keep me warm if an early front or storm came in. I have been doing research on some of the units. I just kinda figured that imma put in for some harder tags like early archery elk and the kaibab mule deer tags, while I wait imma use this year to start kinda doing photography so I can learn about these animals without hunting them. Maybe I'll get better at stalking them I'm the long run too. I'm about 5-7 years away from the unit I wanna hunt. So I figured I'll learn a lot in that time

Put in for the tag you want for yout first choice. Drew an early archery unit 9 bull tag my first ever draw. Honestly, there are several hunts each year that offer both trophy and opportunity, just no one talks about them.