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Elk Secrets
 
 

Wayne Carlton (as told to John E. Philips)

Wayne Carlton shares 10 tips to help you find the bull of a lifetime.
 
Editor, Note: Wayne Carlton, host of the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation's "Elk Country Journal" TV show, has hunted and guided for elk for more than 32 years. Carlton is the father of the diaphragm elk call and creator of Como West, Vanish camouflage. We asked Carlton to give us his top 10, secrets for hunting elk.
 
 
 

 
1 Locate the areas that produce the most big bulls.
Check the Boone and Crocket (B&C) and Pope and Young (P&Y) records to learn the states and counties in those states that historically have produced the largest elk. Learn which counties have most recently produced record bull elk. Due to habitat changes, the more current your information about bull elk, the bettor your odds are for finding them. Arizona, New Mexico. Idaho and trophy units in Colorado all have produced big elk.
 
2 Scout the area you have chosen to hunt.
If you don't have a good guide who knows where the elk wallows are, and where the elk like feed and bed, you'll spend an enor- mous amount of time trying to find elk to hunt. In of the arid states such as New Mexico and Arizona. the quickest way to scout for elk is to locate the water water tanks and ponds, which are generally rather small. The elk must concentrate at those watering places unlike elk that have access to streams running the entire lengths of canyons. Historically, numbers of big elk have come from arid states.
 
3 Hunt elk in their beds
During early morning, elk move from feeding spots to bedding areas with their cows. Late in the afternoon, they move out of bedding regions toward grazing places. Normally, you won't be able to call a big bull elk to you. The only way you can use calls effectively to get a big bull to you is to get extremely close to him. You have to hunt him where he spends most of his daylight hours, and that's in his bedding area.
 
   
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