Utah LE Elk Hunt, Manti Central Mountains Unit, 2019, Expo Tag
EXPO TAG WINNER
My phone lit up with text messages from friends sending screen shots, I’d won. The 2019 Hunt Expo tag winner results were out, and I’d finally won something more than a T-shirt. Manti-Central Mountains, Early Rifle Elk Hunt was now on my calendar for the fall! That $100 spent on entry fees had paid off, and after paying the bill (Utah DNR still sends you a bill for the permit fee if you win - in case you were unaware), I had a tag in my pocket!
SUMMER SCOUTING
Fast forward to July 5th. After spending months digitally scouting with OnX and Google Earth while the mountain was still snowbound from this year’s winter, I took my first trip up to the unit to familiarize myself with the layout in person. No matter how much a person looks at a digital, areal image of an area, nothing compares to boots on the ground. That first weekend of July was rough on my truck, still a lot of snow in the higher elevations, mud and more mosquitos than I’d ever seen in my life. Not a whole lot was seen, but I learned the roads, glassed some big meadows and started working on a plan for my next weekend.
Glassing for elk, July.
The following weekend I went up again, this time on the south end of the unit. I covered a ton of ground with my feet, set a few cameras in some deep canyons and glassed up quite a few elk. After two days, things were looking promising in this steep, thick, timber filled country. Not wanting to put all my eggs in one basket, upon returning home, I got with my buddy, Kelly Cox. We traded some hunting info on units and he showed me some prime areas a little further north.
Deep in the wilderness camping and scouting with my little brother.
The next month and half’s worth of weekends were spent hiking, back country camping, setting cameras and glassing tons hillsides with friends and family. I’d found a stud bull 2 weeks before my hunt began on the south end, and decided this would be my starting location for the beginning of my hunt. Due to my day job as a National Guard Recruiter, I was unable to scout the last two weekends before my hunt began, so all I could do, was hope that awesome bull or one similar was still in the same area come opening day.
Glassing the back country, wilderness slopes, July.
OPENING DAY
September 13th finally arrived, and like always, I was working, rushing to finish packing for a 10 day trip, stressed out and super excited. I didn’t sleep at all the night before; it’s pretty much like a once in a lifetime opportunity to get a Limited Entry Tag Elk tag in Utah. Even though the Manti Unit is managed more for opportunity than “trophy” sized bulls, I was confident I would hold off and wait for a good bull. I pulled out of town 2 hours later than planned, made a stop in Parowan, UT to pick up my primary hunting buddy, Kyler, grabbed some gas and we were on the road!
Arriving to our “base camp” spot 2 hours later than planned, we quickly unloaded the SxS, grabbed the spotters and got out to get in some quick glassing. I had wanted to get around to where I had seen the good bull, but because of shorter daylight hours, we had to make due and glass from the west side and hope we saw something good at all. The plan still remained to get around to the east side of the ledges in the morning, so glassing from the west side was mostly to kill some time.
I was surprised at how many people came and joined us at our glassing spot and the amount of hunter traffic going down the road. I knew they gave out about 117 tags for this hunt, but it looked like an opening general season deer hunt in Utah on Friday night. Kyler was worried we would run into other hunters, but I reassured him that, because this south end was primarily all “Wilderness,” it would be unlikely and only the most dedicated would make the hike.
Can’t forget your Crocs when going anywhere, in this case 3-4 days in the wilderness. Probably as important as food.
Saturday morning came early at 4 am. We quickly got up, cleaned up our basecamp area, strapped our Crocs to our packs and got on the road. The plan was to get around to the east side ledges, glass the morning (hopefully finding a good bull) and then bail off the top with our packs loaded down for a 3-4 day wilderness stay if need be. The 15 mile ride in the morning darkness was cold, definitely letting me know it’s time for a windshield on the SxS, but we got as close as we could, left our packs and hiked out to the ledges to wait on sunrise.
Bugles broke the silence from down below while we sat there in the dark eating snacks, making jokes and talking about how awesome it would be to see a good bull from the top at first light, make a good shot, and end the hunt day one. Little did we know how the morning would actually play out. . .
Hunting a lot with Kyler, we’ve always been in spot and say “wouldn’t it be so awesome if (animal) came in right here and we made a stellar shot from (this spot),” but it’s never worked out before. I hit my Primos Power Bugle and got some responses as the sun was starting to light up the western horizon. There was what sounded like some smaller bulls below us and to the right, but there was a much more aggressive, vocal and mature sounding bull that was closing the distance in the dark almost directly below us. Wouldn’t it be so cool if he was a good bull and I could take an elevated shot from the top?
6:38 am: We filmed a video using MTN OPS “BugleBerry” Ignite (I was not a fan of MTN OPS up till this point as the video states, but my opinion changed as the morning progressed). It was light enough to see me with a cell phone camera for filming, I bugled again after pounding some Ignite and this time, that bull was much closer. We were excited, but not even thinking of taking a shot yet as we doubted this would be a “shooter” bull.
Long shot from above. Just got lucky and had to pee and was able to see him standing down there with my naked eye.
6:47 am: I got up to take a bathroom break and stood up on top of the peak. While standing there, I happened to look backwards and below, and watched an elk step into a very small opening, his body standing out against the white rocks below. Excitedly, I told Kyler there was an elk. He got his binos on him and assured me he was a good elk. With my naked eye, I could see he was wide and dark. I scrambled back down to my spotting scope, quickly sized him up, and clambered back up to grab my rifle. Trying to get prone and clear the rocky ledges below me was impossible lying downhill, so I got a little crazy. Taking my bino harness off, I used it as a wedge on my chest, dug in my toes and laid out over the edge of the cliff, my upper half of body completely unsupported. I ranged the bull quickly and got my drop angle compensation figured out (he was 536 yards horizontally, 886 feet below me). I needed to hold for a 242 yard shot, and that’s what I did.
Was able to recover my bullet at the end. The Hornady 143gr ELD-X performed flawlessly, mushrooming and retaining a good chunk of it’s weight.
Some people talk smack on the 6.5 Creedmore, but I’ll tell you what – with any caliber it’s all about shot placement and I placed that shot perfectly. He was broadside, downhill and I sent it right through both lungs. He hunched up, stumbled, straightened his head and just stood there. I looked back to Kyler to ask if I had missed, but he assured me with a 120% guarantee, I, in fact, did not miss. To be certain he was going to go down, I chambered another round in my Ruger American Predator and as I was pulling the trigger, the bulls back legs dropped. The second shot didn’t even matter, he was already dead. The follow up shot met the base of the bull’s neck and he turned and slid down the steep slope he was standing on, leaving our line of sight. From the top, it didn’t look too steep below, but my experience being down in there previously this summer, I knew better. We waited and listened, no sounds coming out of the timber below.
7:00 am: I sent a text to my buddy Rendell, who was on his way up to glass for Kyler and I as we hiked into the wilderness below, to let him know it was already over. Standing on the point I had cell service and was able to get Rendell’s phone call that he was 5 minutes out. He couldn’t believe that I had already sent some lead and ended my hunt. He was skeptical about the size of the elk, being away from some cows and responding to us up top. . . needless to say, his skepticism got the best of me on our hike into the bottom. I was worried that maybe I got too excited and pulled the trigger too early in the hunt, not that the size of the antlers is what matters (you can’t eat bone, but it was an LE Elk tag). All that worry would quickly diminish as we found him later.
Walking up on my bull, my buddies who beat me there snapping a sweet pic from below
8:30 am: The final stretch to the bottom was intense, we were all sliding on our butts downhill in the shale, trying to slow down before colliding with the large white boulders below. I was the first to spot my bull, whom we’ve dubbed “The Bugle Berry Bull” in honor of the MTN OPS Ignite I was making fun of seven minutes before the shot. Scrambling to get to him, it was excitement all around. He was a good bull, and in a bad spot. His 20+ inch brow tines had dug in and stopped him almost to the bottom of the slope, so us four worked to get him drug over to a flat spot to get a couple pictures and begin the tedious process of de-boning this great animal to feed the family for many days to come.
Notice I’m not sitting 15 yards behind him, holding on to the end of the main beam to make him look bigger than he is (talking about you “Kuiu Club”). He’s just a dandy of a bull and I couldn’t be happier. Pictured is my Ruger American Predator 6.5 Creedmore, some trigger work and a bedded stock topped with an Athalon Argos BTR 6-24x scope - the perfect, lightweight, long range shooter and beater package.
Backstraps are awesome, so much protein. Blessed to have been able to harvest this majestic elk to eat for a long time. De-boning the elk took the 4 of us a couple of hours.
11:00 am: Friends are a blessing for sure. Without my friends jumping in to help with a strenuous packout on a Saturday, this would have been considerably more work with multiple trips. We were able to bone and cape out the elk, loaded the meat bags and sat down for a little break to eat a protein bar and hike out to recover my camera still in the bottom below us. The sun was up, nearly to its peak for the day, not a cloud in the sky. For a mid-September day, it was unseasonably warm, nearing 75 degrees. We quickly worked to begin the long hike back out and up the cliff, knowing full well what was ahead of us.
Loaded down and tied to my Eberlestock G4 Operator Pack. Not the perfect hunting pack, but it got the job done.
My pack, with cape, skull/antlers, water, food and gear was insanely heavy and unbalanced. After weighing everything afterwards, I was pushing 145 lbs, loaded up. Normally, this wouldn’t have been too bad for me as I ruck and hike the hills all the time with a bunch of weight, but the thick timber and steepness of the climb with an unbalance load was nearly enough to break me. After covering the first half mile through the timber, I could feel hot spots on my feet. Stopping the crew so that I could re-tie my boots at the base of the actual steep part (steep is a relative term for this hike), I pulled off my boots to see what was up. Turns out, I had actually worn through a pair of socks on the balls and heels of my feet. Luckily, I always carry an extra pair of socks in my pack for times like this, so I swapped them at, all the while swearing off elk hunting for the rest of my life until I have a helicopter. As a side note, we had horse access, but the cliff climbing situation prevented the use of said horses with an animal on their back, so putting it on our backs was the only way up and out.
Kyler taking a turn to front load my elk head/cape up a landslide to give my back a break for a minute. This is after we swapped it onto another pack. This is NOT a good method.
Knowing full well how steep this hillside was, as I’ve climbed it before with a much lighter day pack, I was not excited. This climb tested me greatly. I like to think of myself as being pretty tough and in shape; I hit the gym every day, ruck, hike and run (very occasionally). I knew it would be tough, but not as tough as it was. My buddies beat me to the top with the rest of the meat and my rifle while I struggled to keep climbing a nearly 90 degree landslide. I eventually stopped and laid down to await their return. We swapped the head to another pack, trying a couple different methods to keep the tines from digging in while going straight up, but none of them worked very well. Kyler and Rendell even took a turn for a minute so we could get back to the top faster as I was clearly spent. 10K feet + 145 unbalanced pounds + straight up a landslide nearly 1000 feet does just not mix well (in case you were curious).
Finally a little cattle trail to ease the pain of bushwacking it. Solid packout up the cliff.
Eventually, we made it to the top and it was smooth sailing the last half mile to the SxS. We dropped our packs, loaded everything back up and strapped down, got my boots off (I had worn through my second pair of socks at this point) and my Crocs on to make the 15 mile drive back to camp. Never had I been so happy to see a side by side or my camo Crocs. The swords (G4s) were so tall on my bull, it made my Teryx look small. The drive back to camp was chill and folks were breaking their necks to check out my bull, stopping me to talk, all the “hunter” sorta stuff. It had taken over 10 hours from the time I pulled the trigger to the time we all got back to the SxS, and getting back to my cot at camp to lay down was the best feeling ever.
Finally to the top and last half mile to the SxS!!
Camp:
Those G4’s look so awesome strapped up in the back of my Teryx when we got back to camp! Now I know why folks were breaking their necks to get a look as we drove the 15 miles back to camp!
Just because we got back to camp didn’t mean the work was over. Rendell and his father-in-law had to split, so they took off while Kyler and I hung the meat, iced the cape and thought about eating dinner. I hadn’t eaten more than a PB&J sandwich and a Quest bar all day, but I was exhausted and didn’t even want to cook anything. Kyler decided to cook some bratwursts up, since that’s easy while I ate a can of oysters covered in spicy mustard (if you’re not doing that, you are missing out). We got some good food in our bellies and then laid down to go to sleep on sore legs and painful backs.
Final:
My buddy, Shane, holding my bull in his living room the night we scored it.
Within a couple of days, I was back to wanting to hunt again, elk hunting being all I could think of. A few days after returning home, we decided to tape the “Bugle Berry” bull, just out of curiosity. Turns out, on a unit with so many hunters, managed for opportunity, my bull scored 360 7/8. I was stoked. Nearly 24” swords, over 20” brow tines, and 51” main beams, he was a sweet bull from that unit. I have no regrets about pulling the trigger by 7 am opening day. All the locals had told me “350 or better, pull that trigger” for that unit. I couldn’t be happier. My buddies saved the day for sure and I couldn’t have done it without them. Even with all the summer scouting I did that put me in the right place at the right time, it couldn’t have happened without them. I dropped off my bull to my buddy, Ron, with Rut-N-Strut Taxidermy and the meat to my other buddy Chris (The Drunken Butcher on IG). I’m excited to see what both do with what I brought them!
Now, it’s just another 10 days and we’ll be back out elk hunting again! Full Youtube video of this hunt coming soon! Will update this post with video at bottom as well share as new post!
Couldn’t have done it without these fellas!
YouTube video of Hunt! Check it out!