Ep. 49: Jason and Cory Calkins
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Welcome back to Cutting the Distance. September is finally here. The bulls are starting to get fired up and that's exactly what we're going to cover on today's episode is elk hunting during the rut. Our guest today is a co-worker here at MeatEater and when I first talked to him, I could tell that he just gets it. He's a great elk hunter. He can talk to people that kind of buffalo their way through a conversation, but you know, we got chatting about elk hunting and things that I did versus things that he did and uh,

You could just tell it clicked with him. He was born and raised in Montana and has spent the last 14 years guiding elk hunters, one in Colorado, 13 in Montana. And those were both on wilderness expeditions as well as private ranches and everywhere in between. He's going to be mad that I added this because I know he was joking when he sent this for his bio, but he said, he has killed more shit than the plague was his last line in his bio. But, uh,

Today's guest is Corey Calkins, great elk hunter, and glad to have you on the show. Yeah, what's up, Jason? Thanks for having me. Yeah. Have you had a chance to get out in the woods yet? Yeah, I went out. It was opening weekend this last weekend here in Montana, and yeah, got out. We had some beautiful weather. Actually, it was a little hot on opening day, and then some torrential rain came in the following weekend.

Sunday and Monday over the Labor Day weekend. It was pretty quiet elk wise in the woods. There were sure a lot of people getting after it. Some hunters, some just recreational dirt bikers, but it was loud in the woods. A lot of people making a lot of noise for sure.

Yeah. I've always loved and hated labor day because it's, it's the start of elk season, but it's also like the last weekend for all the hikers and recreationalists aside from us hunters. And it just seems to pack every trailhead, every good area, everybody's hiking everywhere. And it's, it's, uh, and the elk really aren't cranking. So it's a little bit of your, we're so anxious to get out in the woods, but yet it's not always like the most productive. Absolutely. Yeah. Across the board that I've heard, uh,

Not a lot of bugle in action elk still in their bachelor summer herds, summer locations. But man, it's going to change by the day here as we speak. Yeah. I got to get out this weekend a little bit easier of a hunt because it was a rut hunt. And then the kid had drawn a rifle take, but same thing. There were bulls around. They would answer bugles just enough so that we can keep tabs on them. But if I had a bow in my hand, I would be really...

I wouldn't be real confident that I would be able to make anything happen just how, you know, lackadaisical their bugles were. I really wasn't interested. You know, the herd bull didn't even show up in the herd until...

8.30 in the morning, he was obviously out running ridges looking for other cows and whatnot. And then he kind of showed up and rolled into the group of about 40 cows, but yeah, still real big herds. Um, and they haven't really got broken down yet and bulls still running together. So it seems, I don't want to say it's late, but it's, it's not, it's not kicked off yet for sure.

For sure. Yeah, I don't know. The way this season, at least in the northern half of the Rockies, everything seems to be like a week late. I'm a big angler, too, fly fisherman, and a lot of hatches were late. Rivers were high later than, you know, at least compared to the last couple years. So one's got to wonder if things might be just a couple days or a week later in the elk rut this year. We'll see. Yeah, I...

I mean, we can get into this in a little bit, but I've always been that one. Like, no, your excuse of the ruts late or your excuse of the moon or your excuse of, you know, they weren't bugling this year. Like, I've never bought into it. But one thing the last couple of years, and I don't know if I'm making my own excuses now, but I felt like it's been later.

I don't know how, what I would attribute it to or what, but it seems like, man, they were still going a lot better into October than they have in the past, but may just be me making a weak excuse for myself. Well, yeah, I don't know. October is still a great month. Those first two weeks to get after bugle and elk. They're still pretty fired up. A lot of people give up by then and man, it's not a good time to give up yet.

One thing that I would like to point out, maybe it's not exactly true, but what I've noticed growing up hunting Roosevelt's versus being able to the last 10 years hunt a lot of Rocky bulls is the rut truly is over somewhere. As soon as October rolls around, the elk know Roosevelt's were done, where when I've got to hunt

And Rockies, you know, they're still bugling into the second, third week of October still a lot of times. I don't know if it has to do with herd dynamics or areas or, you know, the health of the herd when they can come into estrus or whatnot. But that's one major difference I've known is that the Rockies seem to rut into October a lot further than the Roosevelt's.

Yeah, our rifle season here in Montana opens, you know, around like the 20th through 28th-ish, fourth weekend in October. And I called in a bull for a client with the cow call that opening weekend of rifle season.

nice yeah yeah it's been good uh same thing with my wife when she had that tag it was october 28th and um on a rifle tag and he bugled 300 times that that afternoon you know once they got out of bed bugled his whole way up before she was able to get a shot at him it was just you know just nuts i don't know if a cow came in late or what but man it it re uh reconstituted the the rut there for at least an evening and we took advantage of it so

All right. Now we're going to, like every show, we're going to jump into listener questions. It's funny, you know, as, as elk season gets close, we get all of these listener questions and I like to, to take those or give them to my guests and let them answer them. If you have questions for, for me or my guests here at cutting the distance, please email them to us at ctd at phelpsgamecalls.com or hit us up on social media, send us messages and we'll do our best to get them included.

So our first question today comes from Holden Coon. A buddy and him are going to go on their first elk hunt this year. It's a rifle hunt. They both have tags. Assuming they're hunting and glossing together and they spot elk, how do you decide who shoots first?

So me and my own buddies, I'll let you go first. We've always had our own system, but I'll let you answer, Corey. If you're equals and you didn't invite somebody or they didn't invite you, how do you guys decide who shoots? - Man, yeah, if it's equal, like you both haven't shot an elk ever before or whatever, I'll usually draw straws or draw a blade of grass.

Or flip a coin, like just make it the luck of the draw. A lot of times like that, the scenario might play out to where only one person ends up getting the shot. You kind of want to leave it open-minded to that, but yeah, I don't know. Flip a coin. See who's luckier. Yeah, that's,

That's how we usually roll. Unless it's a hunt where maybe I've already got to go on a hunt and they don't have as much time or freedom and this is their one hunt of the year, you extend that offer to them like, no, go ahead and start. And then you do every other day. We don't like to both carry our bows around. It's like you focus on what you're supposed to do. I'll focus on... And the chances of us getting a shot at a second bull, there is always that chance, but it's never really...

you know, shown itself. So we usually pack one bow. The other guy is responsible for the calls and the raking and the brushing. And then that way we can just kind of avoid, um, you know, two people trying to get shots or, or, you know, not doing any of that. And, and just like you, we usually either do like one full day. That way we don't have to get back to camp. Or if it's like a rifle hunt, we'll do like a night and a morning, but usually once you flip the coin and get going or however you want to do it, um, just come up with a system, um,

and you know your hunter one day and then your caller the next and you just switch throughout the hunt um and rifle mule deer of course we're not in a mule deer podcast like if it's rifle mule deer we'll just play whoever spots it shoots it the entire time you know so it it keeps everybody on the glass all the time versus a guy thinking he's going to take a nap or whatnot which is another good incentive uh you know if you spot it or locate it or find it then you're up it just incentivizes a

you know, staying, getting after it and staying after it throughout the whole hunt. Yeah. It makes you work a little harder. Um, this is a, this is a question which I I've got a good answer for, but I'll see how you answer. Um, his, his second question also from Holden Kuhn. Um, he wants to be a better caller, but feels he lacks the lung capacity or the ability to call either long or loud enough. Um, is there a way to improve that?

Well, to get louder, he should get the, uh, Phelps metal bugle tube. Can't get much louder than that. My ears ring every time I blow that thing personally. Yeah. Uh,

man, I don't know. There's probably some lung exercises you could do. You know, I know a lot of folks struggle, say they're coming from lower elevation, they go into higher elevation. It can take them a few days to just get their lungs back up and running, especially if they're hiking the hills and working really hard. Uh, it could be hard for anybody to blow a bugle when you're, when your blood's pumping like that. But, uh, man, there's probably some lung exercises you can do. Take some, just, you know, leading up to a hunt, do some

lung stretches not only should you be mentally and physically preparing but also preparing those lungs for for what have you and then just all in all practice bugling and cow calling yeah

And that's, that's what's going to be my two part answer is, is we do design calls, the easy bugler attached to an aluminum or metal bugle tube, very, very loud. Um, and it requires less air than being able to run a diaphragm. So there are calls that will get you the ability to be a better caller or to be louder if that's what you're after. And then one thing we,

you may never, let me, let me back up. Um, just by running calls a lot, like we've been able to be at lots of sportsman shows. We've been around guys that seem to start to show as like a mediocre caller. And then just being in the booth for a week, half into bugle, half in a bugle. It's just like anything, the more you do it, the more your lungs are going to become adapted. They're going to, they're going to be more comfortable and you're going to be able to bugle louder, cleaner, um, all of that stuff. And we've, we've,

you know, we've noticed it at the shows where a guy comes in, it's like, Oh, I don't know if we want him beagling on a call, you know, or, or blowing on a call. Cause it's not really good for sales, but just being around good callers, um, and doing it over and over. And by the end, you're like, that guy got a lot better, you know? Um, and then the last thing I wanted to touch base on lung capacity is one thing. And I'm going to nerd out on people here for a little bit is it's fairly tied. There is a very high, uh,

correlation with your age and your height, not your weight, not anything else. So like a lot of the air capacity, lung capacity charts that I look at when I'm modeling a bugle tube will have the age. I don't remember how all the axes are laid out, but basically age and your height

will then dictate like your max capacity, like output from your lungs. So it's one thing that as you get older, you're going to have less. If you're short, you're already at a disadvantage just based on the correlation. Um, and, but one thing I found is maybe that doesn't necessarily add up because we've got small guys that can crank. So maybe it's a different, um,

you know, uh, a different capacity that your lungs have. But I would say to, to stop BS and about this long drawn out answer is just practice a lot. Um, the more you're in a call, the better you're going to get it running a call, the more control you're going to have over that call. And, and, and that'll kind of fix it for you.

Well, man, fitness, getting ready for an elk hunt, you know, is going to help your lungs, stretch them out, get them stronger, get that fire out of them. The first couple of hikes up a steep hill with a heavy backpack. I don't see how that would, would hurt your lungs to be able to call a little bit longer and louder. Yep. Yep. And allows you to call without taking a minute break. So you can finally, after you get done with it, actually still blow on the tube when you're, when you're grinding it out is also another thing like,

you know i ran into like i need 10 seconds where i can blow on there 20 or 30 you know and the better shape you're in the better you're going to be so

Our second question comes from Nick in Utah, which obviously listens to the show because he starts out, I know you don't use a decoy very much if ever, but I was wondering if you've ever tried using a decoy for elk hunting in the low country of junipers and pinions before. If not, how could or would you use this strategy? And what would it look like in your eyes? If this was used, would it be effective? And then is there a strategy where you wouldn't use this tactic? So go ahead and answer that. Have you ever decoyed, Corey?

I have not. I have not. But man, I really want to. There's been many scenarios where I wish I had a decoy because I think it would have lured them in just that much further because they're pretty keen on coming into the sound of a cow or a bull coming in and curious. But a lot of times if they don't see anything...

That just triggers their nervousness to not come in any closer. And it's happened way too many times where they get hung up at that 60, 70, 80 yard mark. And I believe if a decoy was behind me or behind the shooter, then that would bring them in, you know, that extra 20 yards needed. So no, I haven't ever used one actually in the field. I guess I don't want to carry one around because I end up climbing 12 to 15 miles a day. Yeah.

I'm in the same boat. I've, we've tried to take them and we've lost her before we've ever got to use it on two different hunts. So somewhere out there, there are, uh, there's an elk decoy out there.

Um, but I, you know, just thinking about it, I wouldn't want to use it in wide open country where, you know, things can, can, can look out of place. I think the, the situation they're talking about that Nick's talking about like low country junipers pinions, as long as it's tight enough and not wide open and can be seen from hundreds yards away, it would work. And then it works even better in maybe tight timber where if they can get a glimpse, you know, when they're at 70 or 80 yards or a hundred yards, but real tight, uh, and I'm going to

you know, roll, roll into why I think that a lot of times those bulls will hold up where they expect to see that cow or where that cow can then see them. And they expect that cow to go to them, right? Cause they don't want to leave their herd. And so if you're giving the bull the ability or whatever you're trying to call the ability to see this cow from 200 or 300 yards away, he's going to sit out there most likely not, not always, but he, in my opinion, he's going to sit out there and bugle and then just not come in to within shooting range versus if there is no,

visual and that bull can't lay eyes on that cow uh decoy you may have better options so i think it really depends on how tight the vegetation is when that bull will finally be able to see that decoy and then um you know but like i said i'm just guessed guessing at what would happen um you could have a bull that has no cows and he's always looking for a cow he may run right into that setup versus a herd bull may not be willing to come any closer um you know

and leave his cows for just a lone cow that's out there calling to him he expects her to come to him and so i don't have a great answer for that either but i i think you wouldn't want to use it in wide open country you'd want it to be at least relatively tight enough that that bull will have to be somewhat close to see it yeah engages curiosity just enough to bring them in that much closer for sure yep yep and then our last question i believe comes from cory bonin

Uh, he was wondering if, uh, we've ever covered the topic on post-rut. He lives in Alberta, Canada, hunts elk in the foothills of the Rockies. And he says, it seems to be the rut actually starts to taper off by the third week of September. Um, and their rifle season up there starts on September 17th. Um, and he says, by the time they get to October, they're hard pressed to get any bugles. What are the best tactics for, for kind of that post-rut for, for

you know, kind of going back to what we've already talked about, um, you know, still pretty decent bugling into October, but let's say you had a tag for middle October and still wanted to run calls or use that to your advantage. Like what would be your, your strategy? Man, there's, there has to be a fired up bull somewhere, but yeah. Uh,

having to hunt in an area where a few rifle shots have already gone off, that'll shut some elk up, uh, for sure. Um, you and I, Jason have both hunted in the Bob Marshall wilderness where we can hunt with rifles September 15th. And those first few days are fire. But then when they hear a couple of rifle shots go off there, they're a little less, uh, apt to scream at the top of their lungs. You can still find them out there. Uh, you just might have to dig a little deeper and get a little further back. Maybe where people haven't been, um, uh,

I don't know. I don't think it's worth giving up on just the same tactics. Hunting ridges, bugling, looking for that one that might still be fired up in there because that's still early enough. Obviously, it varies by regions, north to south especially, but man, there's got to be one fired up somewhere. I don't think it's worth giving up on the calling. Yeah, and that's... I mean, elk are just... They've got that built-in safety feature, right, where they do hear those gunshots. Are you...

And maybe, I mean, we can't have a conversation with Corey here, Corey bone and not you. Um, it's like, are, are these elk just non-existent or are you still seeing them? They're just not bugling. That'd be nice to know. But my, my guess is these elk are going back to some Heidi holes, right? They're trying to get away from pressure. They still may be, you know, you may need to go find those. Um, it's tough to, to figure that out. Um, but.

As far as strategy, like I would still, I use, I use my beagle fairly religiously, you know, into the middle of October if I was hunting Rockies, you know, it's like, I will probably get a response if there are cows in the area that are still coming into estrus or even if, even if not, like he still may be willing to try to find that last cow, he may answer you. And then,

As far as calling a bull into range, you know, we're pretty heavy buglers, but I would maybe switch a little more to cow calls at that point, especially if you've got a rifle in your hand. You know, I just got off of a rifle rut hunt and it's tough to like remove myself from my archery tactics.

knowing it's like hey we got a gun you know we're hunting with a gun now i don't need to call this bull into range i don't need to risk getting winded i don't need to get tight like i just need to know where he's at and then we'll find him and so um that's where i would say if you're rifle hunting by september 17th already i would bugle and locate and then turn it into a you know a spot

spot the bowl and try to get in position to shoot it. Um, not necessarily call that thing all the way in. Now, like I said, I don't know where they're at. They might be in heavy timber and I might be saying stuff that just not useful to them, but, uh, that would be my go-to is, is, you know, hunt them like you've got a rifle and maybe some of this stuff we always talk about getting them into archery range. Um, it's just too much risk at that point.

Yeah, no, that's a good, good point. Yeah, maybe to sum that up, just spot maybe shifted more towards spot and stock, but to be able to spot them with either your glass or you can just locate them, get one to screw up by bugling or cow calling and then stock in from there, get a few hundred yards away, got a high advantage with that high powered rifle.

Yep. Yep. So, well, thanks. Thanks everybody for your, your questions. If you, like I said earlier, if you have questions for us, our guests, myself, email us at CTD at Phelps game calls.com or send us social media messages. We're on all the platforms there. Make sure to get them over and we'll, we'll try to get them included here in our show. So.

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Now we're going to jump into my discussion with you, Corey. Tell me a little bit about where you guided, kind of how long you've been doing it, how you got into it, a little background on yourself, and then we'll roll into some questions on your clientele and the elk that you got to hunt. Yeah, well, let's see. Fresh out of high school, I started guiding elk hunters. My first year was down in Colorado.

which, as everybody knows, has an extremely high elk population versus the other western states out here. And it's true. There's a lot of elk down there. We went 64 for 64 in the archery and rifle seasons that I went down there. Not all bulls. We never shot one over 320 inches that year. But man, there's just a lot of elk roaming those mountains. Very impressive. Was signed up to go back down that next year when I was going to be 19, but ended up

land in a job in the Bob Marshall wilderness much closer where I was born and raised in northwest Montana and couldn't pass up the opportunity it started out as guiding fishermen in the Bob and then we have a early rifle season back there open September 15th with a with

with a rifle. And it was kind of always a dream to go back in there to hunt personally. My folks had lived in Montana since the 70s and went back in there on some DIY hunts on their own. And just hearing those stories always wanted to put my boots in the wilderness. And this was a good chance to do it and get paid to do it. So I guided deep in the wilderness for seven years,

um learned a lot about elk hunting i was young that was my early 20s um and then just kind of through the grapevine of working in the industry was able to land a pretty fantastic guiding job uh just north of bozeman here where i live now on a couple different private ranches uh that honestly are the total opposite spectrum of elk hunting um going from

deep in the wilderness having to earn just getting back there mandatory nine to 10 miles on a horse just to enter the wilderness unit versus, uh, shooting elk off the hood of a truck. Not literally, of course, but pretty close. And then loading them in hole, uh, with a wench electric wench in the back of the truck. Uh,

pretty mind blowing spectrum to go from one to the other. I, that first year guiding on those, one of the private ranches up here, uh, had to send video of the first bowl I harvested as a 351 inch bowl that I helped harvest, excuse me, uh, guided. And I went to the whole thing in the back of a truck, was able to drive right to it and had to record the video, uh, send that to all my buddies who were still grinding it out in the wilderness. And they all, I'm pretty sure puked on their phones when they saw that. But, um,

So I was pretty spoiled from there, but definitely earned my stripes, I would say, to get to that point. And yeah, two very different spectrums of guiding. And I spent eight years guiding on these ranches that I'm speaking of.

Yeah. So you've got a real, it sounds like you had a real contrast from doing it maybe as hard and as far away from the truck as you can versus doing it as close. And maybe I don't want to say easy, but definitely, definitely the, the, the odds are stacked in your favor more on that private land. You know, it's, it's managed to be that versus, you know, the unmanaged wilderness, semi unmanaged wilderness. Did you just kind of get what you get and the terrain gets thrown at you and whatnot? Exactly. Yeah.

So quick story about me. I don't know if I've, I tried to be a guide and elk hunting guide right out of high school. And, uh, my parents gave me the, the ultimatum of like, this is where we break your plate. Like if you go to college and go do all of that, you get to, you know, you can stay here and finish out your college. Or if you go do that, like you're kind of on your own and I'm like, gosh, dang it. But, uh,

no long story short i wouldn't trade it for the world like the path i got you know to being able to sit here and have the conversation with you you know we're both in in similar spots but uh that was my that was my goal out of high school i didn't wasn't interested in getting what i would call a normal job or doing the normal i didn't want to go to college but uh yeah that was my goal is to do that guiding right out of uh high school but never never got to it oh yeah i never knew that about you yeah yeah so uh

You got to hunt with a lot of different elk hunters. And, and these, when I say elk hunters, guys that guys and gals that were maybe coming in for different experiences, right? When we booked the Bob, we booked it with the full understanding that if we didn't kill anything, we'd get to see some amazing country. Right. And, and see, but there was still decent, uh,

elk and deer to be had in there. And then you've got to see people that book on these ranches with the intention of, they probably just want to kill the biggest bull. They can as easy as they can do it, be back in the lodge, drinking a whiskey at night, you know? So you've got to see the entire spectrum of, of elk hunters. Um, is there like a parallel you can make regardless of whether they in the wilderness or whether they were down at the ranches that like made a good elk hunter or made a good client or, um, you know, uh,

Is there any parallels you can make there or maybe the major contrasts? You know, just trusting your guide, it would have been a major, I guess it kind of switches up your question a little bit, but kind of a great parallel between the two types of clients that just made,

guides job or my life so much easier was just to listen and trust your guide because they're doing it they've been doing it and you know they're gonna ask you for pointers or your opinion on a certain scenario but just follow the leader whether you're on a horseback or in the side of a pickup truck just trust your guide that he's taking you to the right spot and trying to get you the you know most successful outcome that you're paying for whether it's you know

for a nine day horseback hunt or $12,000 for a five day drive around and spot a hundred elk a day, uh, hunt. They're very different, but, um, yeah. Does that answer your question? I feel like I pivoted. Yeah. Yeah. No, it, it, for the most part, it's a tough question to answer. So I'm going to kind of twist it up a little bit as I present it here is, so let's, let's take away the ranch hunt and let's just focus on the public land, uh,

grind it out a little bit more physical a little bit less guaranteed by by far um when you were up in the in the bob like what do those hunters let's say you're coming from out east you've never experienced the west or like what do these people need to be prepared for like what would be your best guidance you know for them to hit the ground running and maybe be successful

100% physical stamina. Start preparing physically early on. That country we're in is very hard on people. I guided people who had the sheep grand slam on their walls that that elk hunt kicked their butt. It's pretty rugged terrain. Any elk terrain, whether you're leaving the pickup every morning or going deep in on horseback or whatever, elk live in really rugged terrain. Just

physically being, uh, fit, having your stamina as high as you think you got, you can handle it. Uh, you know, you owe the respect to the animal to, uh, say you shoot something and doesn't drop right away. You owe that animal a lot to be able to continue to grind and try and recover that thing. Don't give up on it. Uh, also mental, uh, stamina as well, not only physical, but mental. Uh, if you got, whether it's five days or 10 days designated, um,

and something happens early or it's just the hunt's not going your way. Luck's not having it, uh, just stay in the game and, uh, yeah, stay at it. Mental and physical stamina is so important for elk hunting. Yeah. And one thing, I mean, I'm going to take a little side approach, but even the physical side that we rode, there was a fire the year I went in there and we had to come in a different direction. So we were on the horses for, or mules for 30 plus miles. Um,

There were a few of us that had been working out fairly heavily and we were okay because we walked about eight miles and walked our horses for another 22 or whatever, you know, plus or minus a few miles. It was a long, it was before, you know, dark to after dark sort of a ride and,

There were some of the guys in our crew that couldn't walk the next day just because of the horse ride. And, you know, guys that aren't horse guys or mule guys and the guys that were in better shape and had been working out, we were sore, but we were able to go, you know? And so it's like it all tied in like something I never would have thought preparing for a, for a hunt because I, I'm not a horse guy. I'm not a mule guy, but you need that to be able to access that country. Like,

Like the physical went as far as that. And then these guys that maybe needed some breaks, like the very next day, we didn't need to recoup from our base camp. Then we spiked out an additional five miles because that's where we thought in these other guys were like, Oh no, we'll do it later in the hunt. And we went, you know, we were there to go be successful. And that was kind of our mindset. And, um, that's where, you know, we always look at physical and mental as different, but

I would always argue that a lot of your mental will come from physically challenging yourself because that's usually where you start to question your, your mental starts to come into play as you're sore, your feet hurt, you're tired, you know, you're hungry, this or that. And so you let that physical, uh,

like start to affect your mental, you know, like, well, I'm going to just hunt around camp today. Not saying it's not a bad, it's better than not hunting at all, but it's also not as good as climbing back up to the top of the mountain, you know, where you think the critters might be or whatnot. And so my advice is always getting as good a physical shape as you can. And it's going to limit your exposure to that, like mental,

uh, you know, breakdown or, or your ability to talk yourself out of something. And then I'm going to add one more piece onto that, like good hunting partners. Um, I'd be lying to say that I'm always like,

at the very top physically or at the very top mentally, there are times where you need a hunting partner that's just as dedicated to the cause as you or somebody you can, you know, pitch ideas off of. And at times when maybe I'm not feeling it, they'll pick you up. And when they're feeling down or out or don't want to give it the extra effort, you're like, no, we need to go up there. And at least the group that I run with, like we push each other so hard that you never want to let the other guy down. And so it's nice to be able to like, well, no, we're going up there and you're going with me whether you want to or not.

Absolutely. Yeah. Picking great partners for that, uh, is key. And if you're ever going on a guided hunt, usually typically not always, but your guides, you know, that guy who's waking you up in the mornings, uh, getting you going in the afternoons, keeping you, keeping your head up. Yep. I want,

I didn't realize, and I feel for the, I understand why we took the two hour naps because they need, I needed it anyways, but those guys are out wrangling hobbled horses and mules at like three in the morning where we're still sleeping. And then they get you up at four 30 and it's by time they're done taking care of the horses. Like you guys deserve a bigger tip than, than I get that I gave, you know, and it was my good buddy, but I'm like, gosh, dang, you know, these, these cooks are up at three in the morning, starting your meals or lunches or whatever. And

I don't know. It's not for the faint of heart. You better not need sleep to be able to survive. No, it's a lot of hard work for sure. Late nights, long days. I mean, you'd sneak in a little nap midday, kind of, you know, you want cool sleep.

uh, you know, kind of overcast weather, you know, consistent weather, but you also kind of hope for really hot weather. So you can sneak in that two or three hour nap while the Elker laying down midday, whatever it takes. Uh, but it's a lot of hard work, but yeah, it's, it's, you don't see too many older, like especially wilderness hunting guides. It's a young man's sport, uh, career. Um, but I wouldn't trade it for the world. Those are the, those were the times back then, man.

All right. So let's diverge a little bit from the clients. And I'm more interested in the elk, the differences that maybe lived 30 miles from anywhere. Elk that never seen a person compared to these elk that live on a place that was pretty much designed for them to live.

for them to flourish, get as big as possible, carry the absolute highest carrying capacity you can versus the opposite of just being in the middle of the bob or some remote Colorado wilderness where they're just given with what's on the ground. Are there any major differences when you'd go to hunt those elk as far as the elk are concerned? Or are they different creatures as far as being able to call them, pattern them, whatnot? You know, it's hard to say. My original answer just now was going to be that

Elk on some of the private land obviously don't have the pressure as much as public land, say, whether it's deep in the wilderness or just your typical national forest trailhead. But elk on private land don't seem to run away as far. Now, they're elk. They're skittish. You bump them once, that's probably your only opportunity. But a lot of times they know where the border of that

private and public land is. And they don't want to go to public because last time they did that, they just got bumped right back onto private. Even if those ranches are being hunted and hunted hard, you know, with multiple clients every week, they still know where the border is and they don't necessarily want to leave. Now, what makes me backtrack that answer a little bit is in the vast open public land, wilderness, what have you,

You bump an elk and you're looking at such crazy, massive country that you're not going to ever be able to catch up to that. Where on a big private ranch, yeah, you can give it a half a day and then drive your truck over there and be to the other end of the ranch where that elk headed within an hour or so. So I think just the terrain, whether it's private or public, if an elk runs away from you or goes over a ridge that just doesn't look passable to your...

or your whereabouts, whether you're on foot, horse, or vehicle, that's probably the biggest difference is just the terrain for the elk and for the hunter. Yeah. And one thing...

that, you know, being able to hunt, I haven't got to hunt. I have hunted some private land, but like the ability to pattern those elk, right. Because those elk on private, like we know they're probably going to go bed here. They're probably going to come out and feed here versus sometimes up in the mountains, you know, if a cougar or a wolf runs through there, I mean, it could happen on public or the private chunk as well, but it, it seems like, um, you know, the private stuff

There may be a little more patternable, a little more predictable versus up in the mountains. It's like they may feed in this section one day. And then for some reason, the lead cow takes them to a different spot the next day to feed or they're in like, you know, a three or four day rotation, you know, versus in one thing that I've heard. And maybe you can, you can.

you know, solidify this answer is like a lot of times on these ranches, they won't let you go hunt them in bed. Right. Cause they do not want you to disturb them. They don't, they want that pattern to be the same. You get your one shot in the morning, why the winds, right? The bull goes in there, you're taking the afternoon off versus in the mountains. It's like, you know, everybody on the mountain that spotted any elk going into a bedding area, you're going to get bumped or killed one or the other. It's like,

For the majority of guys, right? They're going to go in there and keep chasing elk until they either bump them or kill them. And so that's one nice thing where it's managed a little bit better. And, and, uh, I, I never fault anybody for, for going a little bit harder on public ground or mountainous ground because that's your opportunity. Right. But that is one thing where I think that, that private land ranch stuff, whereas if you've got rules in place that, that

make sure that those elk don't necessarily get ran out of there, um, is a pretty good system that their pattern stays the same for quite a while. Yeah, that's very true. Well, yeah, I guided on two different ranches here, uh, in central Montana and yeah, the, the latter one that I've guided on, uh, yeah, we, if you weren't back for breakfast by 11 AM, like if you didn't have an elk on the ground, uh,

the outfitter started getting a little suspicious that you were maybe hunting a bedding zone or something. That was definitely rule. Number one was don't hit hunt the bedding zones. You bump an elk out of his bed. He's not coming back for a while. Uh, and that was the last thing we wanted. We wanted those elk to stay there to feel somewhat comfortable. And your opportunity in the morning and the evening was so great. Uh, whether we were sitting tree stands, sitting by wallows, uh,

or spot and stalk trying to be in the right place at the right time. It was a very open country. And of course, the elk are going to come out to those openings in the middle of the night. And then where they would go in was the limited bedding areas. And those were just, yeah, do not enter. Off limits. Didn't want to be invited back. And you wanted to be invited back as a client or a guide. It was a cool place to hunt.

And I think that lesson can maybe translate into public, right? Right. I mean, we do, we talk about hunting bedding areas and we talk about like midday magic, you know, that you can get into, but there is something to be taken away. Like if you want those elk to continue their patterns and do what they did the day before and where you found them going into their bedding area could be

could potentially change their patterns if you bump them or blow them out of where they think a safe, secure spot is. So I always, I mean, this is a great way to reiterate, like go in very cautiously, whether you're on public, because the guides and the ranches are running the system for a reason to make sure those elk continue to do what they've did.

Yeah, no, it's smart. It's a smart system. Yeah, so if you've got time and you watch one go into a bedding zone, yeah, maybe if it's dry and crunchy, leave them be. But if it's wet, drizzling, and you might be able to sneak in, take your boots off, maybe it's worth going in there, especially if you're limited on time. But yeah, you've got to make that tough decision. So this will be a good segue. I'm going to ask you, and then we're going to talk about some of the hard –

you know, it's sometimes hard to talk about elk hunting, right? Because you've been, we've been doing it for so long. Some of it's just kind of ingrained into, into our thought process, but is there, can you define what makes a good, uh, time to go into a bedding area? Is there, is there like a few things you check off a checklist where you will go into a bedding area or how does that decision come about? Or there's just so many factors we can't

Hardly talk about them. I don't know a few of the main factors I'd say how many eyeballs just went in there, you know if it's a bowl and I don't know more than Four cows that went in there. That's a lot of eyeballs you're trying to sneak in on Unless you can I think that your ultimate scenario would be if you're like say across a ravine and you can see how they're bedded Exactly where they're at find yourself a little ambush route you know, you're fairly confident which way the winds blowing in there and

then you're set. But man, yeah, the number of eyeballs and then also how loud it is, how crunchy the leaves and the pine needles are going to be. You can always, I've taken my boots off a hundred times trying to sneak in on an elk and it's worked a couple of times. I even took my, my, my britches off once just so I didn't have my legs swiping back and forth. That time it did not work. I was caught in the middle of a herd of elk running away with my pants down. No pun intended. Literally.

But man, yeah, eyeballs and how dry it is, man. If you can get in somewhere where you know where he's at or where your target is at, and if it's like drizzling rain, your scent's not pushing around as much, you got a pretty good chance of getting close anyway. Yeah.

Yeah, no, I like it. We've, we've tried to approach a lot, but a lot of times we get turned away like brush on the entry. We're gonna have to be noisy to get in. Like if I've got good elk trails going and like you said, there weren't any satellite bulls. That's one thing that I almost always abandoned the mission. If there's a satellite bull, because we're,

And inevitably, and it makes total sense when you think about it, that satellite bull doesn't get to bed with the herd, right? That herd bull will. And that satellite bull almost always gets kicked downwind of that. And so when we're approaching to be good elk hunters, we're going to come in with the wind in our face so those elk can't smell us. But guess what elk you run into about 150 yards out?

you run into that damn satellite bull almost every time we've tried to approach that way. And so if we know there are a bunch of satellite bulls around, it's proceed at your own risk. Like how late in the hunt is it? How quick do you need to try to make something happen? If you've got a lot of time left, we usually just leave it alone. But yeah. Yeah.

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We talk about elk hunting and all of these are like very cookie cutter examples, right? We say the wind's doing this or the elk are doing this, but a lot of times like what's the moon doing? Has it rained for the last week? Are the elk rutting? Are there cows in heat? How big are the herds? How many satellite bulls? Like all of these things boil in to our answers and it makes it talking about archery elk hunting interesting.

It makes it difficult. And I think that's why we, we, a lot of times just talk about our system, right? It's easier for me to talk about the system, but then all of these variables still come into play. And one thing I got, I got a question the other day is, is,

is what makes a good elk hunter or in your opinion we were talking about it around a campfire on on the elk hunt that i was just on um and i kind of came up with this is i think most successful elk hunters have a system that they use um they stick to it for most part of the hunt

Um, but the one thing I've found out is if you look at all the successful elk hunters, their systems aren't necessarily always similar. And so I was trying to boil that down, like, how does all that work? And so what I've really kind of said is, is, is rather than try to play every variable all the time, like just stick with a, you know, if you're a, if you're a caller call, if you're a spot and stalker spot, if you're, um, what have you found Corey, as far as like, what makes somebody successful year in and year out, you know, you, you, you,

You're typically always able to kill your elk or help buddies kill their elk, fill their tags. In your opinion, like what makes a good elk hunter and consistent? Well, I brought it up earlier. I think just the both physical and mental stamina, uh, odds are it's not going to happen right away. Uh, or even where your plan a or even B spots are going to be. So being able to, um, stay with it mentally and physically, obviously, and, um, grind it out.

Don't just stop in your plan A or B spot. Say some other folks are there. There's just not elk happening. It feels like the rut hasn't started or it feels like it could be a little late. Maybe switch it up. Be a little bit more open to try a new area.

whether that means driving somewhere or having to hike, move camp. I think just kind of keeping it open-minded, not sticking, not having the tunnel vision for one plan. Having a great plan A, plan B is important, but man, have an X, Y, and Z plan too. Hopefully you give yourself more than just a weekend. Obviously, if you can get out every weekend of the season, that's great, but give yourself five to ten days for an area and don't assume that it's all going to happen overnight.

right then and there. So I think just being open-minded and then having that mental and physical stamina to, to last, uh, your, you know, allotted hunt window, uh, is really important. And that's something that I've noticed I've been able to do, uh, was younger. It was frustrating not having plan a or B go right, but just being, um, you know, knowing that you're, you can't control mother nature and having a plan X and Y in your back pocket is super important. And

Maybe not with meat in the freezer, but I at least have a heck of a hunt. Yep. And that's one thing we learned as we started. I grew up in industrial Timberlands hunting around home. You packed your lunch for the day. As I started to venture out and hunt what I'd consider more mountainous, more adventurous type elk hunting, we would go in like, well, how are we going to carry all of our food? We hadn't had it dialed in. So we would pack 10 days of food into one camp six miles in. Well, guess what that did? That locked me into an area where

for the entire time. And it's like, well, then you were basing your stay based on what your food's already all in here. Or, you know, this is what we had planned on doing for 10 days versus where I'm at now, where I pack maybe a half a day's food. I can live off of it for two days. And if there are elk there in that half a day, I know I'm going to be back at the truck, going to a different trailhead or a different area, you know, and it sounds so cliche and we say it over and over, but you need to be able to like pull the plug and not be married to an area or a spot

because it looks good on onyx it looks good on google earth it looks good wherever if there aren't elk there on that year so if i can't go into a spot and find very fresh rubs very fresh sign elk scat you know whatever like i'm out and especially if you can't add a live elk to those tracks you know a bugle or spot them with your glasses um i'm out of there and one thing you know i think people overlook is like well it looks kind of fresh like well that

Once that elk crap or track, you know, if it hasn't rained or whatnot and washed it out, like those elk could have been there two weeks ago. And in the month of September, those things are moving. If they got bumped out of there, they might've went to drainage over and never came back. Like you just might be in the wrong spot.

Um, so yeah, I, I feel that being willing to move, um, get out of a spot, go try plans, you know, B through Z or whatever it needs to be like, um, have the ability to open up on X or whatever mapping software you use say, well, I think this spot might be good. It's going to take me, you know, hour and a half to hike in this three miles. That's where I want to be and go try it out that night. Um,

One thing we talk about is if you need the third part of the day, go locate at nighttime. Do whatever you got to do, but you need to find some elk and just keep moving zones. Yeah, even if it means changing mountain ranges, at least where elk tend to live in the Rocky Mountain West.

you got a lot of options and any, you know, unless you have a trophy unit tag where you're restricted to a certain zone, you're just carrying a general elk tag in your pocket, man. You got, you got a lot of country to explore. So go check something new out. You might've had a great spot that was great last year was great. The year before historically a great zone. They're not there this year.

switch it up or, or also stick to it. You know, if it's been a good spot, it might just not be in there yet. You know, it's, it's, I've been amazed by the number of times where I've given up on a spot. Well, not a hundred percent given up, but like, man, tomorrow I'm leaving if I don't see anything in the morning. And sure enough, a huge herd elk moved in overnight and there they are. So it's tough what to say, you know, flip a coin to make a decision. Cause it's,

It's a lot of skill, but man, there's a lot of luck involved. Don't forget that. For sure.

Um, so we're recording this on September 5th. We both just came off of, you know, you got to hunt a little bit over Labor Day weekend. I just came off of a hunt Labor Day weekend and one, or actually two of the things we were dealing with on for both of us is, um, the moon we're coming up. We were at a full moon, the, on Thursday, I believe, which was August 31st. And then we, we rolled in, we got a bunch of weather Thursday, Friday, and then coming from Washington, it hit you guys what Saturday, Sunday, I think.

Yeah, Sunday, Monday. Yep. So you guys got the weather after us. So next thing I want to talk about is your opinion on does a moon matter and how that affects it versus and then we'll jump into the rain and that system that rolled through. Yeah, don't hunt during a full moon. Stay home.

Uh, elk aren't even out, out in the woods. I don't know where they go, but no, I'm totally kidding. Uh, I'm sure it affects them. And I've always had this theory that, uh,

whenever like the second, third, fourth week of September lines up with a full moon, that's going to be kind of towards the peak rut. The elk get to do their dance during the evening twilight hours while they can see a little bit better. They get to roam a little bit more. I don't know if that theory is true, has any, any truths to it or not, but, um,

man, when elk are fired up, they're fired up. And if it's the third week of September or wherever, you know, kind of the peak time might be for your region, whether it's a full moon or a new moon, I don't think it matters. Honestly, I haven't noticed anything. I've, I've killed elk on a full moon and I've killed elk on a new moon. Um, it was, it's hard to tell what it is. I know it's easier to sleep with a new moon cause it kind of keeps you up at night when it's a full blast in your eyeballs. But, uh, yeah, I don't know.

14 years of guiding 20 plus years of just hunting myself. I haven't noticed, uh, at least in September, uh, a difference with the moon. I'm, I'm right there with you. And I just kind of sum it all up is there's only so many days in September. I'm going to be out there as much as possible. The one, the one thing that, that throws a little bit of a, of a wrench in my system is maybe somebody contacts me with, I only got one week to hunt.

Um, and then do you put them around the moon? I usually don't. I still say, what are you after? Like, do you want post? Like, do you want peak of the rut? Then you have to be there on this week, regardless of whether the moon's there or not. That's when you're going to get your most action, your most bugling. And so, um, yeah, I don't pay a whole lot of attention to the moon and this is going to show everybody how big of a nerd I am. I had went back, I looked at a bunch of trail cameras and then like timed it with what the moon was on that.

and what time they were showing up at a specific wallow. And it didn't really matter when the full moon was there. They showed up a little bit later. They didn't, they weren't coming in the daylight and they left a little bit earlier, but it really didn't affect things through the end of August into like the middle of September. I think when we ran that cam,

And then I had just looked at like there for a stretch of like the 10 bulls I had killed. That was like from, I don't even remember 2005 to 2015. And I had looked at all the bulls that I had killed and almost all of them were within four or five days of a full moon. It's just how it landed, how it had added up. And, you know, some were on the front side, some people, you know, the, the moon, the

The guys that claim the moon really matters always say that you want to be on the backside of the full moon, you know, tailing off. But it was five days before, five days after. It didn't really seem to matter. There was no correlation with when I killed and what the moon was doing. Interesting. Well, I know you brought it up that this was going to be our next topic. So this kind of segues. But I certainly think weather has more drastic involvement with elk habits versus the moon.

So what's your opinion on a rain system or a snow system that moves in? Let's say it's been decent weather, rain moves in. In your opinion, or what have you seen that do to the elk or the rut?

Man, what I've seen, consistent weather, whether it's rain or dry, is key. So, you know, having a week of rain, they're still going to do their thing. But having a week of dry and then all of a sudden a rainstorm comes in, I've certainly noticed it shut down, or at least it feels like it shuts down. I always assume that estrous smell of cows...

breeding that scent in the air just kind of gets locked down with that moisture in the air is what I've always assumed but man I've chased elk that have bugled all day long in a heavy rain that turned to snowstorm two bulls dueling it out for about 30 or 40 cows all day never been able to get close enough to the bulls could have shot a few of the cows many times

but that didn't affect them one bit. And it was a snow rainstorm that came in after some 80 degree heat. And then it was the next day. Um, so I've kind of seen it all, but it does seem like the rain that kind of comes out of nowhere, uh, and breaks up a dry week, at least in September, you know, we're still dealing with some warmer temps, uh, right now versus say later, October, November, um, that it does affect them, whether they just don't dance in the rain or, uh,

the scent or something, but, but it's still worth going out. No doubt. Yep. And I've, my, my experience is almost mirrored years that it's not so much the consistent rain or the consistent sun, but it's that change. And within like three days of that change, you know, it's on the tail, tail end of it. So for instance, when you haven't had rain for 90 plus days or something like that, we were getting ready to go hunting. And Thursday we get that downpour before we leave. And,

And it really quieted things down to compared to what everybody said that the elk were doing that unit. And they slowly started picking back up as the weather was getting nice again. And, uh, the same thing, I think if it's been raining for, for, you know, five, six, seven days, the elk are getting used to it. And all of a sudden you get a high pressure move in and it gets nice. It's like, all right, it takes a couple more days for things to like get, get back into, into normal, um, conditions.

And, you know, we've had, you know, up in the high country, we've got snow a little bit and it doesn't, it seems to be more of like middle ground. It doesn't seem to, for some reason, snap them in or out as much as rain versus sun. But that's just maybe my limited experience in the high country. But it seems like the rut just kind of continues on, at least in the snow. I don't know why or how come, but just from my experience, the snow didn't seem to affect them as much as the rain.

Yeah, no, I know. And you can't pick the dates necessarily. Excuse me. You can't pick the weather of a hunt that you've had planned for weeks, months or years even. But, you know, an ideal weather condition would be just like consistent 60 or 70s, maybe a little chance of rain here or there. But, you know, if you're if you're crossing your fingers for weather, just hope for consistency for sure. Yep. Yeah, I like that.

like overcast with a little, you know, 50% cloud cover good, you know, mid, mid temps, cool in the morning, crisp in the morning. And then, you know, maybe heat up to six or 70 in the afternoon. Like that's, that's my favorite. Um, the other thing I hate systems coming in and out is because it screws with your wind, um, on both ends of it, right. Is you get these pushes now, all of a sudden you're not just dealing with the local thermals. Uh, you're

you're now dealing with these crazy swirling winds it's just a headache to deal with and that's possible you got to wonder if that affects the elk you know their their habits they get a little nervous when they're so used to that southwest wind at least here in montana you uh prevailing winds southwest and then all of a sudden it's out of the northeast they're like oh i gotta you know change my location where i'm gonna feel comfortable during the day not gonna talk as much i'm it must affect them as well so yeah you definitely gotta change up your tactics

Yeah. I mean, not that we need to think like an elk, but we've all watched them in the morning. They go from their feed to their bed and then they bed down and then they go from their bed to their feed. Well, one thing that I didn't think about a whole lot is a lot of times they let that wind switch and they're feeding with whatever predator would be in front of them. They're feeding out into that wind. Right. And they're doing it. They're, they're not dumb. They're, they're always smelling what's ahead of them, whether their eyes can pick it up or not, but they typically don't.

will, will feed with the wind in their face. That way they can smell any danger that they're walking into. Well, like you had just mentioned, you switch the wind on them 180 degrees. Well, now that bedding and feeding area connection is like broken up, right? They can't do that. They've got to go to a different feeding bedding area combo or connection. And so it really, and maybe that's why, maybe that's why it really kind of throws their, their pattern off.

Um, but, but yeah, I've noticed that, you know, wind switches or you've hunted an area for two or three days. You about got it figured out and all of a sudden some weather moves in and your plan that you'd been building is completely thrown out the window. You can't do it anymore because the wind's goofy and they're, they're uncomfortable and they've changed their pattern.

Yeah, well, it's a question as old as time. Every elk that I try and ask, or at least that I try and get close enough to ask the question, they seem to be dead on the ground. So I never get the chance to ask them. But one of these days, maybe I'll get to whisper in an elk's ear and ask them,

what's up with their habits. Yeah. I wish I could figure all that out. I'd be a lot better elk hunter. I think then, then just taking a guess at all this stuff or what's worked one time, but then it doesn't work the next 20 times. It's that's the only thing that's like a given when it comes to elk hunting is that it's never going to be the same from time to time scenario to scenario. I feel like you can have all the factors exactly the same on scenario a versus B and the results will be different just because of that elk's personality and

or, or something that that elk just isn't going to do the same thing. And that's,

I mean, I don't claim to know, but I feel that there's some of that that goes on where one bull might be full of piss and vinegar that you're trying to hunt. And one bull might just want to avoid any confrontation. And one thing us as elk hunters need to figure out is how do you deal with each one based on the way they beagle, the way they react to calling, the way they react by just watching them through binos. And that's some more of this stuff we talked about earlier, which I kind of stumbled through on how to describe it is that

All of these little tips and tactics get like brought into the decisions. Like, well, that bull's super hesitant. Or you see a bull over there, like trying to rip a satellite's head off. Anytime it gets within a couple hundred yards, you're like, well, that's a bull I can challenge, you know, or get close to. He just seems pissed versus, you know, one that doesn't really care for satellites. Yeah.

I don't know. I, all that stuff matters and should affect like your next move when you're out there elk hunting. Keeps you on your toes for sure. Yep. Yep. So, well, I really appreciate having you on here, Corey. Um, I know you're, you're getting ready to take off for, for the month of September and I've got a, got a hunt coming up. So, uh, the best of luck. And, um, like I say, really appreciate you coming on here and talking elk hunting here. Um,

Thanks for having me. Yeah, I'm excited, man. We'll be in touch. Best of luck to you. I know you got some fun trips planned or one big epic trick planned for sure. I can't wait to hear how it goes. Yeah. All right. Well, take care. We'll catch up to you on the backside of hunting season. Sounds good, Jason. Thanks again.

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