Two States, Two Elk, One Bullet


Guest ronin

Recommended Posts

I was incredibly lucky this year and managed to draw a coveted California Tule Elk cow tag as well as an Idaho controlled hunt also for a cow. In both cases I used my own handload for the 300 Remington Ultra-Mag of 97 grains of RL #25 topped off with a Barnes 180 Gr. VLC X-bullet.

I harvested my Tule Elk at about 140 yards or so and she dropped after two steps. The bullet obviously performed flawlessly, however, I was unable to locate it as it was a through and through shot.

I took my Rocky Mountain cow at 256 yards and she disappeared from my sight picture before I could refocus after recoil. Needless to say, she dropped in her tracks. I recovered this bullet and the accompanying photos are indicative of it's performance. Remarkably, the bullet crushed several ribs and came to rest in a shoulder blade. There was absolutely no loss of mass.

The difference in size between the Tule and the RM Elk is significant. They were roughly similar in age yet the tule weighed about 200lbs less. The RM cow was about 600 lbs. However, the Tule's ivories were approximately 30% larger.

[image]bullet.JPG[/image] [image]idahoelk.jpg[/image] [image]jjelkemailcopy.jpg[/image]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: Two States, Two Elk, One Bullet

Nice cows. Is it just a once-in-a-lifetime thing there in CA? We can get a tag for a specific season once in every ten years. But there are other elk seasons in SD that you can apply for during that time. We have a herd of about 2,000 Rocky Mountain elk here in SD, and most are in the Black Hills National Forest. I want to apply for a bull elk tag next year along with a mountain lion tag in case I see one.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.