Don and I brought back a cow elk Tuesday night. A couple hunters from Cambridge loaned us a thousand feet of rope. Don went down the hill about 250 yards and tied the rope around the elk's neck. We tied the other end to the hooks mounted on the front of the Dodge 4WD. I backed the pick up, retied, put on the chains and backed the PU up until we had the elk on top of the ridge. Leaving the pickup lights on, we cleaned the elk in the dark, cold (21 degrees), and in a blinding snowstorm. Then we drug the elk a half mile to a vacated hunters' camp where we had seen a cross beam mounted. We had a block and tackle thanks to the Cambridge hunters, so we used the pickup, rope, and block and tackle to pull the elk into the air, back the pickup up under the elk and with a great deal of effort get the elk into the bed of the truck. Hoisting around a 300 pound animal is not easy.
The next day we got the animal quartered and hung. I spent two different cleaning sessions with Biz and detergent washing the blood from the interior of the pickup.
Friday we go out again scouting for Don's elk that he must shoot with a black powder loading muzzle gun. Effective range is no more that a hundred yards, so this hunt will be more challenging. We will be hunting with my school principal and his son and our school's football coach. D might be joining me as I birddog through the brush pockets trying to drive elk towards the hunters. If they succeed, the work starts all over again. Right now I am a little stiff and sore.
1 comment:
Dang, you look cold!
It's snowing right now here. Won't last, but the kids think it's great! Miss you, punch Cousin D in the ribs for me and tell him I love him and he needs to take his frozen self the Coast sometime!
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