CB11WYO
Well-Known Member
Mom's rifle elk tag here in SW Wyo opened on the 1st and burned some vacation to go with her and dad for opening day.
Dad had camped and scouted for 5 days, saw +30 bulls and had us all adrenalined up when first light of opening morning finally came lol. Nothing played out for us in the morning though. Plan was to find the jumbo 7x8 that he had put to bed the night before, but that bull being cow-less had obviously left the country by the time morning came. Nowhere to be seen. We got eyes on a super big 5x6, enormous whale tales, with some cows a few different times but kept on hunting.
That evening we hit a two tracker down in some cedar canyons just to see what we could see. A good ways into the drive we spot a couple bulls mile or so off down the gentle draw that the road looks to be heading down. A few sets of binoculars and a Leupy Spotter confirm there's 3 bulls and 10 or so cows. Two of the bulls were rags but the third was a good looking 6x, though we can't tell exactly how big as they are bedded just into the shady side of the draw, still out in the meadow in plain sight.
We head off down the draw on the opposite side from the elk. Using the cedars for cover. We ran out of dense cedars at about 800 yards. We actually set up there for 10 minutes, bipod and rifle ready, mom in the scope ready to turn him into hamburger, but mom wasn't cool with the distance. We finally zig-zagged in plain sight, cedar to cedar until my Leica 1600B and Dad's G7 BR2 both read 600 yards. Mom was good with it so we plunked her down again with my good ol' 7 Rem Mag and told her to get to it! Now the bull was up and beautifully broadside, facing left. She hammered him... first shot hitting slightly forward, square in the lower part of his shoulder, obliterating his left front leg. His cows ran off, but he was in no shape to follow. He made it 20 slow yards and 2 more Bergers in the boiler room ended the ordeal. Tough old guy.
Upon arriving we were absolutely tickled with how big he was! No ground shrinkage lol Average bottoms with Jim Dandy 4ths, 5ths, and 6ths. +50" main beams with lots of curves. Awesome bull. And the only bull she's ever killed to boot! Extra bonus was he crumpled one and a half jeep lenths from the two tracker ha ha that's good luck.
A hunt to remember for sure. We scored him the next morning in camp just for kicks and came up with 336". Puts him in the family book with my 340" and dad's 350" for sure!
Rifle:
Remington 700, Broughton 28", Shrewd Brake
HS Precision Stock, Leupy 8.5-25x50LR
180gr Target VLD's @ 2900 fps
Found one of the follow up shots under the hide on the off-side during butchering. It penetrated fully through the boiler room, have yet to weigh it but will post in another thread about bullet performance later.
(more pics in next post)
Dad had camped and scouted for 5 days, saw +30 bulls and had us all adrenalined up when first light of opening morning finally came lol. Nothing played out for us in the morning though. Plan was to find the jumbo 7x8 that he had put to bed the night before, but that bull being cow-less had obviously left the country by the time morning came. Nowhere to be seen. We got eyes on a super big 5x6, enormous whale tales, with some cows a few different times but kept on hunting.
That evening we hit a two tracker down in some cedar canyons just to see what we could see. A good ways into the drive we spot a couple bulls mile or so off down the gentle draw that the road looks to be heading down. A few sets of binoculars and a Leupy Spotter confirm there's 3 bulls and 10 or so cows. Two of the bulls were rags but the third was a good looking 6x, though we can't tell exactly how big as they are bedded just into the shady side of the draw, still out in the meadow in plain sight.
We head off down the draw on the opposite side from the elk. Using the cedars for cover. We ran out of dense cedars at about 800 yards. We actually set up there for 10 minutes, bipod and rifle ready, mom in the scope ready to turn him into hamburger, but mom wasn't cool with the distance. We finally zig-zagged in plain sight, cedar to cedar until my Leica 1600B and Dad's G7 BR2 both read 600 yards. Mom was good with it so we plunked her down again with my good ol' 7 Rem Mag and told her to get to it! Now the bull was up and beautifully broadside, facing left. She hammered him... first shot hitting slightly forward, square in the lower part of his shoulder, obliterating his left front leg. His cows ran off, but he was in no shape to follow. He made it 20 slow yards and 2 more Bergers in the boiler room ended the ordeal. Tough old guy.
Upon arriving we were absolutely tickled with how big he was! No ground shrinkage lol
Average bottoms with Jim Dandy 4ths, 5ths, and 6ths. +50" main beams with lots of curves. Awesome bull. And the only bull she's ever killed to boot! Extra bonus was he crumpled one and a half jeep lenths from the two tracker ha ha that's good luck. A hunt to remember for sure. We scored him the next morning in camp just for kicks and came up with 336". Puts him in the family book with my 340" and dad's 350" for sure!
Rifle:
Remington 700, Broughton 28", Shrewd Brake
HS Precision Stock, Leupy 8.5-25x50LR
180gr Target VLD's @ 2900 fps
Found one of the follow up shots under the hide on the off-side during butchering. It penetrated fully through the boiler room, have yet to weigh it but will post in another thread about bullet performance later.
(more pics in next post)
