2024 AZ elk chronicles

[ktg]

I was seriously thinking of moving to AZ for 6 months so i could draw this tag as I had 12 points and it took about 21 to guarantee drawing this year. Then I unbelievably drew a random tag. My wife drew it 3 years ago so we weren't going into the unit blind like usual. Bad new is that my youngest son drew the UT youth general elk tag which was right in the middle of my season. My wife insisted that i hunt the whole season in AZ as I told her that was my only regret on her hunt, that we only hunted 10 days. She stayed behind to be his guide and my 2nd to youngest son went with me to AZ for the first 2.5 days of the hunt.

I'm going to chronicle my time in Arizona, a day or 2 at a time, depending on how eventful the day was. Most of these will include text updates sent to my wife so don't expect proper english.
9-13. Friday the 13th. There were gremlins in my truck. We decided we needed to be extra careful on this day. lol.
Tried going to pond. Wind was wrong so we went around the road we took the first time we went there. At the turnoff there were 5 or 6 bugling south. Got 100 yards from a herd. Too many eyes. Chased the others a mile up the hill and gave up. Found 2 bulls bugling this afternoon. Got one to 100 yards and wouldn't come closer. Went to red rock hill. Pond is dry. Nothing down there.
First thing we were walking towards that herd, bugles every direction non-stop and turkeys yapping. Kael stopped and said "this is so cool!" lol. Saw more turkeys and 5 coyotes. I could have shot one at 10 yards but that's when that bull was at 100 yards. Saw 4 bucks, Kael said 3 were 4 points. Small.
While we were calling in that bull, my watch told me this, never seen that before:

 

[elkhunterUT]

I'm here for it - keep 'em coming!

 

[grizz19]

Love it! Keep the updates rollin!

 

[Deercy]

Definitely. Looking forward to the updates.

 

[ktg]

9/14
Started today before light at parking spot for big pond. Nothing there. Drove around to where we found them yesterday. There were bugles way up the mountain already. Drove up there and started after one. Heard a bugle that sounded suspicously human. The elk all moved back down the mountain. Found a couple guys who had hiked in directly upwind of the elk. It all makes sense now. Headed back to truck. Down the hill we went to find the elk again. Started after some again. Spotted a bull a couple hundred yards away. Kael set up and started calling and I moved to a forward position. The bull was screaming! He started to move downwind and towards me. Had him broadside at 70 for several minutes but he was only a 5 on the one side. Pretty wide though. Then he stuck his nose in the air and he was gone. Got after another one but no luck there. By then all bugling had stopped. Jumped a 5 point and a spike late morning. Seems like they're active for about 3 hours in the mornings and 3 hours in the evenings. Time for a nap.
Tonight Kael stayed behind to work on school and I hiked to a guzzler I found by the slash piles. 0.6 miles in. I bugled halfway. Nothing. About 100 yards further up the hill, I jumped 2 cows and a bull. IDK how big he was. Sat on guzzler for an hour. Nothing. Went to slash pile pond. It's dry. Went to another pond. Dry. Drove down the road bugling. Nothing. Decided I needed to be higher elevation. Drove to the closed road at the bottom of the mountain and hiked in. Pretty steep getting in there. 1 mile hike. Right at the top of the trail I heard a bugle that sounded like it was over the next ridge. Started over there just to find out they were on the top on the ridge next to me. Cows busted me and they started to take off. The bull didn't know what was going on so he would run in front of the cows and put his antlers down to stop them. Eventually the cows got around him and took off and he followed. I'd say he was about a 310 bull. I followed them. It was pretty open ponderosa forest. Could see 200 yards pretty easily. I got to the edge of the next draw and stood behind a tree. They were in the bottom and he was screaming his guts out. The cows had me pinned down so I called back and forth with him. After a few minutes I heard a bark behind me. A 5 point had sneaked in behind me. He just kept barking at me till he finally wandered over the hill. The 310 bull wouldn't leave the cows. I had 30 minutes of good light so I decided to try to get closer. Cows busted me right off. They ran up the hill and he was still screaming like crazy while I hiked down the mountain.