We approached them on opening morning through open country and when we spotted them decided they were closer to another road than the one we had parked on. We decided to split up, my brother went back to the road to come in from the other side of them while I continued to work my way toward them.
They were feeding well into the morning hours and by about 10 or 10:30 I was within 300 yards and they were starting to bed down. The herd may have been upwards of 50 animals, but many of them were out of my view up a little draw. I thought I'd just be ready to camp out on them for the rest of the day, meanwhile trying very slowly to get a bit closer through what was by now crunchy snow remnants. A couple of times I got laser readings of 250 give or take, my maximum range (or at least my maximum practiced distance to date). But, every time I sat down to deploy the shooting sticks I found too much vegetation complicating the view and the shot.
Keep creeping... very slow... then saw a couple of animals get up and resume feeding. I was finally in a spot with a clear view of a portion of the opening they were in, and got a good reading of 255 yds on a standing broadside animal. Good sit, with both elbows anchored on knees, sticks very steady... Man, they look far away through the globe site, but this is what I practiced for and I'm thinking it's now or never.
Settle in, good squeeze, bunch of elk stand up at the shot while the one I was aiming for and another run a little up the draw. She's partially obscured by a tree, but I'm thinking I see her rear back a little bit and fall.
All the others are starting to mill around, a bunch of them come back toward me into the bottom of the draw I shot over. When I stood up they milled a bit more then worked their way up the draw toward where I presume the bigger part of the herd was.
Cross the draw, keeping my shooting site in view, found the cow only about 30 yards from where she was standing when I shot. The cartridge was 45 - 2.4, the load was 77 gr 2F swiss under a 485-grain 30-1 Paul Jones flatnose. The bullet busted the upper leg of the near shoulder, went through the heart, and I found a major chunk of it under the hide on the opposite side. I was a little suprised at how much of the bullet was not still there, as this is the 2nd cow elk I've shot with this bullet and the first time I don't think the bullet lost more than about 15 grains of weight.
Never posted a pic before, but here goes with an attempt with a photo my brother took for me:
. Using a range finder looks so easy on the tv shows and when I use mine I'm constantly trying not to range the grass in front of me.
I guess I'll leave it to him to post the pic.
