Outdoor Report

No animals were harmed in the making of this column

Posted 1/5/23

Feathered edges of hoar frost twinkled on the road in my headlights as carefully I pressed west. My vehicle was the first to head down the path on this brisk morning, making fresh tracks at 5 …

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Outdoor Report

No animals were harmed in the making of this column

Posted

Feathered edges of hoar frost twinkled on the road in my headlights as carefully I pressed west. My vehicle was the first to head down the path on this brisk morning, making fresh tracks at 5 a.m.

I can get a bit grumpy when my morning alarm sounds before sunrise. Yet, I’m up, well coffeed and ready to roll on hunt days.

The first day of the season was a disaster. I was heading up Skull Creek with a rare limited-draw bull elk tag in my zippered coat pocket and a well-seasoned hunting partner behind the wheel. We had thought it was too early to expect to harvest an elk, but were itching to get out of the house and enjoy leaves of cottonwoods and aspens set ablaze by fall.

I like to refer to early season hunts as scouting missions to avoid admitting I got skunked.

Before we reached our chosen destination, a herd of elk a few dozen strong broke from the bottoms and headed our way.

There was very little time to react, but my .30-06 was unloaded and locked in its case stashed in the back of the 4x4.

“Get your gun,” Frank insisted after pulling off the double-track to a safe place.

After years of elk hunts, he understood the urgency of the situation. I had yet to see the majestic bull trailing the small gang and was unprepared for the serious business of hunting — still content to simply be a spectator as we made our way up the steep incline toward the peaks in comfy bucket seats.

I put my rifle to my shoulder in my first attempt to search through the scope for fur with zero success. Frank reminded me I needed to use my left eye.

Some things seem so natural, like raising a gun during a hunt, I forget my mostly useless right eye is now only there for decoration.

I repositioned my weapon to the left side, lined up the shot and squeezed the trigger. Unfortunately, I sent the bullet harmlessly over the behemoth’s back. I’d love to say it was a rare miss, but even with two good eyes I was never a great marksman.

The next couple of hours were spent looking for evidence of blood and feeling foolish. The only blood on the scene was mine. I broke a shoelace earlier that morning and didn’t have a spare. I opted to go with a lighter pair of boots, thinking they’d be fine. They weren’t.

During the long hike over the next ridge I could feel my feet blistering. There was nothing I could do but continue to move forward. By the time I got home I was wounded — both physically and emotionally. However, at that point I had no idea what we had in store during the two-month season. Frank did. He’s been through decades of hunts in northwest Wyoming.

He knows how tough elk hunts can be and would proceed to teach me the lesson he has known all these years from assisting family and friends on hunts near his Heart Mountain-area home. A lot of folks think drawing the tag is the hard part, possibly me included. Prior to taking stock at the end of my season. I soon learned harvesting an elk would be a true adventure.

The next hunt came after multiple checks of my weapon. I arrived at Frank’s house two hours before legal shooting light. First thing he did was hand me a new shoelace and encourage me to be ready.

“There’s no telling when our next opportunity will come, but you need to be ready,” he said.

The “this time” was implied.

Frank knows about missing. He’s an excellent shot and knows the backcountry of the Shoshone National Forest better than most. Yet, every seasoned hunter has at least one story of failure — the type that keeps you up at night with regret.

Every step of the way from that point forward I tried to listen and keep my eye on the prize. By foot, truck and horseback we chased every opportunity despite harsh conditions during the many hunts. Honestly, I can take the cold. But when it joins forces with the Wyoming wind, my resolve weakens.

Looking at me it might occur to you that I’m well-insulated. Come to think about it, I don’t remember ever having a cold belly on a hunt. Somehow, I never managed to grow much of a warming fat layer on my fingers, toes or nose.

I can still remember dreaming about adventurous hunts as a kid. I had a Daisy BB gun. Fortunately for the backyard squirrels, I was a bad shot back then as well.

As a youngster, I read just about every book written about Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett. I loved watching Mutual of Omaha’s “Wild Kingdom” and thought wrestling pythons was a reasonable job. I toted around that BB gun everywhere, often riding a bike with the handlebar in my left hand hand and my fully-loaded Daisy in the right. Yet, in the dreams of my youth I couldn’t have imagined more adventure than Frank and I found.

During our multiple trips into the wild we hiked up steep hillsides, nearly rolled the truck, traversed the craggy spaces between the desert and the peaks on horseback, got that same truck stuck on the coldest day and hunted a herd that seemed to know our every move before we got there. We saw the herd often, but always from unmanageable distances, on private land or before and after legal shooting light.

It was the first time I had ever seen Frank (or anyone else) from about 3 feet above him while riding in the passenger seat of his truck. But it was far from the first time he had saved my bacon. Frank is like Smoky the Bear. He has the facade of a toothy grizzly bear, but only wants to put out fires. I couldn’t have found a better guide through the mountains.

Try as we did, I never took a shot after that first blunder. Yet, I wasn’t despondent.

Spending time with friends and seeing our fabulous natural resources during the chase was more than enough adventure to make the highlight reels of my life.

The hardest part of the season ending, after becoming addicted to watching the first hints of morning light as it tickles the snow-covered peaks, is being forced to return to the adult world.

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