Elk Hunt in Southwest Washington

[Ragnarok Forge]

I will be planing to head up there on Friday night of the first weekend of season.  I get off work in Gresham at 5:00 pm and will have to hit the house so I won't be up in camp until 8:30 or 9:00 pm.  I will look up the campground on my maps and plan to head there after I pick up my bow and hunting / camping gear.   Did you find a place to hanng the meat in a cooler for a weekend or the week in the area?

Chat at you soon.

[STIKNSTRINGBOW]

Is that the first weekend during season(11th) or Labor Day (4th)? I will be there, 2nd-13th.
Yes I have a place to hang them in Naselle for $8 a day....

[Ragnarok Forge]

I will be up there the first weekend, not the 2nd weekend.  I have a combo goose / deer hunt on the cowlitz the second weekend.  I then plan to go back out to the bear river unit for a 4 day weekend over the 18th - 21st.   I will most likely drive my totyota corolla instead of my truck.  With all the roads gated and closed, I shouldn't need the 4 wheel drive.  It will cost me less than half in fuel for the multiple trips I plan to take up there.  I also plan to hit it in late season if I don't score early season.  

Where are you based out of?  I have a couple of sweet spots in the Ryderwood Unit that are between Vader and Castle Rock.  They are 1 hour from my place.  I scouted them and stump shot tonight and there was tons of sign in the area.  I hit a couple of trails that looked more like roads than elk trails with all the travelling traffic they were getting.

[STIKNSTRINGBOW]

I am still confused, Opening day is a tuesday, will you be there, or not until the weekend, 11th-13th?
I live in Chehalis/Adna right off of Hwy 6. Your sweetspots sound interesting, but not enough days in the season to hunt them all......

[STIKNSTRINGBOW]

Well, plans change. I will be solo, out of my minivan from 6th-13th. Maybe I'll see ya!

[STIKNSTRINGBOW]

Before I begin, I will say that I did not harvest an Elk yet, and I repeat yet....

I will begin on the day before the opener because due to my planning getting all messed up I was unable to depart until late Sunday/early Mon.

I was still about 10 miles from Naselle at first light and saw that even after a whole week of rain Weyerhauser had not opened their roads yet, so I expected increased pressure in the area due to it being DNR, Hancock, and Nature Concervancy property.

Upon arriving at my gate, I was surprised to see that there were no other vehicles parked there.
I took a look around and saw that across the valley from me in the opening caused by the powerlines were 3 elk just moving into the trees.
I watched them disappear and noted what trail they were using and figured I just might go there next morning.

I then figured I would drive up to Snag Lake Campground and see if I could meet up with anybody interesting to swap stories with.

As I got back on the paved road I headed east towards Naselle. After driving about 500 yards down road I see 25-30 Elk in the field on my right with 5 branched antlered bulls and stop to take pictures until they run off and then discover I did not have a card in my camera!!    

I continue on road and about 1/2 mile past the guys property is a Hancock gate with a truck parked at it, and I figure this guy knows what he is doing by being back behind the private property and make a note about location of the gate for future reference....
 
A little further down road I see a spur road, without a gate, or mailbox and decide to drive up it and see where it goes. I drive up it and after a little ways in I drive past someones camp, so there is a few places closer to area to camp if the campground at lake was not so cool....

The road ends a short distance past the guys camp so I turn around and head back and a little ways up road I run over a little pecker-pole that punctures my front tire    .

So there I am about 50 yards past the camp on the side of the road with a flat tire when I discover that the only way to get my tire-iron to fit over the lug-nuts is to put it on the bottom one and pound it on with a chunk of wood, and then move car forward until next one is on bottom. After I have all but one loose I break my tire Iron and still have one to go and am starting to think I am going to be hunting right here! I then hear the camp moving around and they get into there truck and start to drive until they see me and stop to see whats going on.
I apologize for waking them up and they laugh about it and say "no problem" and offer to help.
Unfortunately their iron wont fit either so they offer to drive me into town and see about finding some tools.

This being Labor Day, the only places open were the Fuel Station and the Bait Shop, The fuel station had no tools, but the guy at the bait shop set me up with a socket,extension, and ratchet.

I want to take this time to thank both places and the two guys (I cannot remember names) for being very friendly and helpful.

I got my spare on and back on the road quickly after this experience.

I ALSO learned that Salmon fishing in the Naselle River was doing really good and the locals would hunt in the morning for the elk that liked to stay around the open fields and clear-cuts near town in the mornings and evenings and fish during the day, next year I will be sure and bring my rod!

Now that I was back on the road I drove up to Snag Lake Campground and there were lots of camps there, I should have been there a week ago to set up, but that will have to wait until next year. Realizing that without a clue of recognising anyone without wandering around all the camps, I decided to just go back to my gate and get my gear all set up for the morning hunt.

After getting back at the gate, I set my spotting scope up to keep an eye on the power-line opening and just hang around for a while.

I was sitting there for a little bit when Clay showed up and we introduced ourselves and shot the breeze for a little bit. He told me about seeing some elk back in the area I was watching, including a nice bull that his wife kicked out of bed, so we decided to hunt down in there the next morning.

We then took a walk back behind the gate I was parked at to look for deer and stretch our legs.
We walked in a good ways and saw a little sign, including some bear scat on road. We looked at some Old Growth Timber with trails that would require some more investigating and got to know each other a little better.

He headed back to his camp after agreeing to meet me in morning at the gate we were going to hunt behind and invited me along, but I decided to stay were I was and watch the drainage some more.

As I sorted through my gear, several trucks pulled up to gate and turned around. Some stopped and chatted and one was going to park there with me for the night.

Around 7:00 I saw elk in clearing I was watching and eventually counted 18 elk feed out into and down it on the same trail as the ones I saw that morning, including one nice bull!!
They started bugling as the sun was setting and I could tell that there were more bulls than just the one I saw, I was excited and knew I would have trouble sleeping in anticipation of the morning to come!!  

[STIKNSTRINGBOW]

The alarm goes off at 3:30 and I am pumped!
Due to my socks having been a little damp after my previous walk the night before because my boots were not completely dry, I decided to wear my extra boots today.
I have a little "wake me up" morning and get dressed and grab my pack and go wait at the gate to meet Clay.
Around 5:00 another truck pulls up with 3 guys in it so I figure I will meet up with Clay later and start down road to get ahead of the pressure.
About 1/2 a mile in I notice my damn boots are squeaking and decide it is too far to walk back to rig and change, so I plan on doing a lot of sitting.
Just about then those 3 guys blow past me on their Mtn. Bikes and I wonder if I should bring mine next year (along with fishing rod).
I finally get to opening just at legal shooting light and pick a spot on down-wind side of trail and settle in to wait for action.

After about 15 minutes I hear a lot of splashing down hill from me and look down to see a 4X5 bull struggling through the mud and wonder if he is hit, he finally clears mud and reaches the open water of slough and swims out to island, climbs out and shakes like a dog, looks around and starts walking up-river. Obviously O.k.
I realize that if I do get a shot at an elk they will probably run downhill and end up in that mud (not a good predicament) so I decide to pick a better spot and walk to road that continues past opening. This road is literally covered in droppings! I mean a pile every 10 feet or so! I follow it around a half a loop and it circles back to opening under powerlines and I find a nice spot to sit on a log up against a stump about 15 feet from trail and settle in to wait a while...
Unfortunately after a couple hours nothing comes through, the sun is shining, and I figure it is time to do some exploring.
I return to original road in creek bottom and slowly walk down it, stopping and eating Blackberries and Huckleberries as I try to cover ground and not squeak too much.
The road takes a sharp bend and I decide to sit on a log for a while there and when I get to log I notice those three bikes laying behind it and check my GPS and see I am only 1.57 miles in.
I sit there any ways for a little bit and then continue down road because the only trail is the "reclaimed road" that the bikes are on and the surrounding area is full of trees laying down from thinning and no possible way to walk around in it, let alone sneak through it.
The road I am on only goes maybe 1/4 mile before it ends at a little camp spot next to creek.
I remember Clay telling me that he followed the creek up stream a little ways when they saw the elk, so I crossed to check it out.
After crossing creek I got into some good looking area and picked a small clearing to set up and do a little cow-calling and after a while with no response I attempted to cross clearing and after a few steps I ended up to my knee in mud, so I backed out and returned to creekbed.
I followed creekbed a little ways and saw something strange back in the trees, it was the color of one of those plastic pumpkins you see at Halloween. I stared at it through my bi-nos and could not tell what it was so I left creekbed to investigate. I found the walking fairly easy under the old-growth forest and noticed that all the ferns were missing the last 6 inches or so off the tips of all their fronds, making them look like they were all trimmed.
When I got to orange thing I found it to be a very large shelf fungus of the Chicken-of-the-Woods variety and wished I had a working camera with me. This thing was almost 2 feet across on 7 layers! and bright orange! very cool!
I wandered around a little and although there was some elk sign, there was not as much as back by the powerlines and I was 2 miles in all by myself and figured I should head back, so I went back to small camp area by creek and just took a break there for a while when Clay showed up and we compared notes.
He told me about getting into them in that area in the morning and passing an easy shot on a cow before getting blown and pushing the animals out of area and we headed back down road.
I slowly walked down road, eating blackberries and we seperated due to my sqeaking boots and different plans for evening with talk of hooking up again sometime.
I went back to log under powerlines and waited for the evening to arrive.
Around 6:30 I saw a cow come out in a different opening on top of hill about 200 yards away from me and watched her through bino's and saw she was on full alert and watching something else up-hill from her and she eventually went back into woods without me seeing what had her so tense.
Around 7:20 a bull started bugling on the backside of the ridge I was on and I tried some cow-calls and bugles to bring him over, but only got him screaming at me, and another bull below us answering back until dark. I walked out and thought about the nice day I enjoyed and thought about what I was going to do for the next morning.........

[STIKNSTRINGBOW]

I forgot to mention the 6 grouse Clay and I saw (no shots) on our first meeting/walk.
I also saw that the herd I saw before the opener were back in the guys field that night as I drove to town to call home. A couple cows crossed the road also near where the other gate was I had seen a truck parked at before the opener and decide to investigate there in the morning.
After calling home and being reminded I had to mail a package I had sold on "the auction site" the next day, I returned to my trailhead/gate that I was spending my nights at.
I was informed that the other guy that spent the previous evening there had walked down road about a 1/2 mile and shot a 4pt bull opening morning by someone else hunting the area, and was happy for him, but had a case of "I should have been there" blues.

During the night I was awakened by something outside my vehicle and saw about a 250# bear licking the road where I had drained some sardines and oysters for a little snack. He spooked when I opened door to get a better look at him.

[STIKNSTRINGBOW]

After seeing all those elk near the field, I decided to hunt the gate close to them that I had seen the other truck parked at. I got there early to be the first one there but while I was waiting for shooting light 2 guys showed up and hustled past me. As I walked up road I saw were there was a definite trail heading back behind the property that both guys had gone down by their tracks in the morning dew. I kept walking all the way out to were the road ended, under the powerlines again. I saw a couple elk across the creekbottom feeding into the timber and tried to call them to me, but no luck with that.
I hung around a while and  then figured it was time to go to town and get package mailed.
On the way to town I saw a couple elk in the fields along road again and saw the benefit to sticking close to area.

After taking care of some business in town, I headed up to say goodbye to Clay and see how he had done.
On the way up I noticed 2 trucks parked near road about 1 1/2 miles up, but payed them no attention.
 While Clay was packing he told me he got into them again that morning, but no shots. Some other guys came to get his spare wood and told me about the 5pt bull they had shot on hill above lake and I watched some guy over on the lake catch a couple pan sized (10-12inch) trout. Next year I am DEFINATELY bringing a rod!
After saying good-byes I headed back down hill and on the way found out that those 2 trucks were packing out an elk they had shot that morning!
Next year I am also going to make sure to get a spot at that campground!
I also saw 2 grouse on side road and tried to walk back and get a shot, but no such luck.
I spent the evening checking out other gates in area and looking at elk in fields along road.

[STIKNSTRINGBOW]

It is now the third day of season and after an early start I walked down the original gate I had planned to hunt. I went down every spur and found a lot of sign, including a couple rubs, and also an overgrown trail heading down towards field that I have seen elk in everyday.
 After a couple spots were I had to crawl through blow-down, I decided that I would have to come back next spring with a machete and saw to clear it out for a stand down behind the guys property.    
 During the day I was walked up upon by 2 other hunters covering the area that told me about other guys in their group that only hunt the side of hill above the field. I decided to move on further into unit.
Because I was alone I limited myself to 3 miles from gate and picked a spot near an opening and creek bottom and did a little calling and just hung around for a while.
After I had been there about 1/2 hour, I heard a couple cow calls from creekbottom, so I answered with a couple of my own and was responded to by some bugling and a few more cow calls.
They were not coming to me so I decide to bring it to them, but after being spit back by the dense brush a few times I tried to head up creek bottom and got into knee deep mud, and the wind was all wrong. So I tried to figure out some way around. The only way in I could figure was to circle up above and approach through the old growth we had seen on the first day, but being a wimp (old, fat, and out of shape) I was reluctant to do this without a partner.
I left those elk for another day and headed back to vehicle.

I got back around 5:00 and with little time to waste I went looking for a short road near town, with (hopefully) some openings for a quick evening hunt to look for sign.

I picked a short road and parked at gate and walked in a little less than a mile. I found a comfortable log to sit on and did a little calling.

I was about to give it up around 7:00 when I heard a couple cow calls from up wind and answered with a few of my own. We went back and forth a couple times when I heard a CRACK and they were coming in!!!!

I hunckered down and waited until I saw some ears, It was a cow and a calf!!
I was getting pretty excited because they were headed right at me!!
They finally stopped and the cow was 16 FEET from me, but had an old stump covering her vitals. She was looking right at me wondering where the elk was that was supposed to be standing there and the calf was wandering past me on the trail I had walked in.
I tried to figure out how to make a shot without spooking them when she called the calf back and started getting nervous.
She turned and did not offer me a shot and started barking and looking around until she stiff legged out of there, stopping to look back at me every couple steps.
WOW!! that was FUN!!, but I wished I would have had a partner to put out in front of me at the first response so we could have had a good shot as they came in. Oh well, you play the cards you are dealt.
I walked out of there pretty pumped, this is what its all about  

[STIKNSTRINGBOW]

Having heard some bugling during my walk out, I planned on being back in the morning to investigate area further.
I met up with a c-pounder who was hunting by himself also and he asked to come with me so we made plans to meet and I went to get some sleep.
We walked in while it was still dark and heard some walking through the bushes, but with no shooting light we could not do anything but wait.
After hiking in and looking at the area, we saw a lot of sign, but no animals.
We decided to go look at another area, but it had no sign other than deer.

We talked to another hunter who saw a bear and used his open-reed cow call like a predator call and called him in to 50 yards before attempting a shot (compound) and I wished for the same opportunity.

I headed back to the morning road to see if anything showed up while I was away.

This time I took a different fork and before I had gone 1/2 mile I was seeing a LOT of sign!
There were definite trails through the woods,fresh droppings and tracks.
I continued down road and 3/4 of a mile and There were some 3-5 year old clear-cuts on one side with a creek-bottom and tall trees bordering it. I REALLY liked the looks of this spot and another 1/2 mile I came to a good spot along creek with grassy openings and some rubs, trails, and droppings and decided to hang out for a while.
Around 7:00 I heard some branches break and the swishing of bushes, so I let out a soft cow-call.
I heard some more branches crack and then some further up drainage.
Thinking I had been found out, I tried to figure out how. The wind was right, but I kept hearing noises seemingly getting further away....
I got back on road and started walking in the direction I heard the movement, when all of a sudden I saw a cow about 20 YARDS AWAY!!
I stopped, pinned out in the open but she resumed feeding and I tried to find an open shooting lane. I then heard more noise and realized I had walked up on a herd feeding down towards the clearcuts!
While I was standing there in the open trying to pull my thumb out of my @ss one of the elk uphill(and upwind) started barking and the closest cow actually spooked about 5 yards TOWARDS me!
With the elk on full alert and no shooting lanes I decided to slowly back off and wait closer to clearcut for them to show.
I waited until dark and headed out with the sound of bugling ringing in my ears. I was "picking them up and putting them down" when I stumbled around a corner and spooked some elk off of road into trees almost where I had parked my vehicle. Figuring these to be a different herd due to distance apart and different drainage, I realized I had found my spot to dedicate my efforts.
I was the only one hunting this section of unit for some strange reason, and I wasn't going to advertise.

[STIKNSTRINGBOW]

Having made plans to meat up with Damon (C-pounder) at a different gate, I waited there for him until 5:30 and when he didn't show I hauled my butt to area, but found out I had left my non-squeaking boots back at camp I had to go get them. By the time I FINALLY got my act together it was full daylight, but I decided to go look around anyways.
As I walked down road I could smell elk and there were a lot of new tracks were elk had crossed road, and in some cases even walked down it a ways before going down into creek-bottom.
I decided to walk road out to end and see where it went.
The road headed way back across 4 different drainage's and I saw a lot of sign of feeding and droppings. All the ferns were missing their tips (Just like I had mentioned in a different area). This place was full of elk, I just needed to be in the right place at the right time.
After I was in there 3 1/2 miles I decided to take a nap and stick around until evening and hope for action.
I was back in spot I had run into herd the night before at 5:00, found a good spot to wait and stayed there until 7:15, with nothing showing up and darkness approaching I decided to slowly walk back to vehicle.
I was almost to area with clear-cut when I saw some elk on trail heading towards it, unfortunately they saw me and turned around and started walking back uphill. Because they were only walking I tried to circle around them, but they outmaneuvered me and it was getting darker. I gave up on them and headed back to road and decided that because it would be dark soon I would cross the clear-cut and head out to highway to walk to vehicle and avoid spooking any more elk.
When I got to open edge of clearcut there were 2 elk standing about 50 yards from me staring at me like "where did you come from". Unfortunately the wind was right at them so I just kept walking like I didn't see them and got the heck out of there!

[STIKNSTRINGBOW]

This was going to be the final morning of my hunt and Damon (the c-pounder) wanted to tag along, so we met at gate at 4:30. Having seen good sign just a short ways from gate I decided to wait until closer to shooting light to start. I figured to use this time to quickly drive to town and use a porta-potty at CFN station. After pulling out from gate I saw 2 elk along-side highway that had just crossed, leaving the area of clearcut that we would be hunting and hoped they were not the only ones using it this morning.
After "taking care of business" I returned and we got underway....
Only about 1/2 mile down road we heard some branches breaking and both set up on separate trails in hopes that they were coming our way.
The elk were down in the creek bottom and turned out to be a herd of 15+ animals. The paralleled road and eventually crossed about 50 yards from were we parked, we were unable to capitalize on opportunity.
On the second walk towards clearing we called a 5pt bull to within 45yards, but he wouldn't come past a patch of vine maple to present a shot.
We eventually made it to clearing and found plenty of fresh sign and walked a little further down road and saw that there was a lot of very recent activity in creek bottom and surrounding area indicating that there were at least 2 different herds, or a VERY large one using the area on a regular (daily) basis.
We both wished our trips could be longer because we both had to head home that day, but planned to be back for final weekend of early season............
on the walk out we saw were a few elk had crossed road after we passed, and wondered why NOBODY ELSE was hunting this gate. We hope it stays that way until our return.....
I will let you know how we do this weekend.  

[STIKNSTRINGBOW]

Heading out early so that I could arrive at gate before first light, it was pouring down rain.
Just before I reached South Bend, I hit a large puddle and threw my serpentine belt.    
After this delay, I was back on the road, but had lost valuable time.
Arriving at gate after daylight, I saw Damon's truck and wondered how he was doing. As I walked in there was no new sign and I was a little discouraged. I met up with Damon and he told me he had been coming in since Thursday night and there were 2 other trucks parking at gate and he hadn't been seeing anything. It was obvious that they had been pushed out of area since our last visit.
Due to the rain he had rented a room at a local hotel ($40 a night) and was going to head there to eat and check in for another evening and told me he would meet up with me later.
I decided to poke around a little more and see if I could figure out where the elk went.
Having spent most of the day wandering around on the roads, cow calling occasionally, I found myself circling around and rejoining main road about 1/4 mile from gate.
Seeing that it was 5:00 i sat on side of road and started fiddling around with my GPS and see if I could come up with an idea of what to do next.
I had been there about 20 minutes when I heard some branches break in the direction of creek. I did a couple of soft cow calls and whatever it was came to edge of road, on other side of bushes, but didn't come out. Next thing I heard was a low bull squeal and tried to lure him out with some soft cow calls, but the wind was wrong and I got busted.
I hung around until dark just in case, but nothing further happened.

I met up with Damon at local fuel station and we discussed plans for next day. while we were there we talked to the other guys that went to the gate and found out somebody told them the elk were in there every morning so they went in and chased them around.(thats why they left)

We decided to check out a local farm he had permission to hunt, figuring private property was our best option.
The next morning we parked at farm and as we were getting ready the farmers dog kept barking at something in back and we hoped we hoped he wasn't chasing elk out. (we later discovered he had treed 2 'coons).
We walked back behind property and although it was a beautiful spot there was no fresh elk sign. After climbing up on ridge behind property, we had walked a short ways along when I got an answer to my soft cow calls and an elk was coming towards us, but Damon tried to help and used his open reed call (that was too loud, I think) and all went quiet.
With Damon needing to get back to hotel to check-out, we called it quits and headed back to vehicles. We stopped and talked to farmer and he said the elk were in his field the week before, 25-30 head with one nice bull, but he hadn't seen them since.
I screwed around the rest of the day, and just before dark I thought I had one coming in, but it turned out to be a doe that I didn't get a shot at.

Another sunset on the close of Early Archery Elk Season, I learned several lessons and had a great time. Met some nice people and saw some beautiful country. I look forward to late season and am already planning for next year.

 

[wingnut]

STKNSTRNG,

Great story and thanks for taking us along.  This has been a hard year on me with no elk hunting for only the 2nd time in 33 yrs.

I've hunted areas like you are describing.  One tip is to get into those creek bottoms in the summer and find the travel routes.  Usually you will have major trails through the thick.  Then hang a tree stand.  Get in there a couple hours before daylight and you'll get yourself an elk.

Mike

[Warberg]

Very cool Blake, next year might be the time for change,, Keep ya posted and thanks for the story..Warberg

[STIKNSTRINGBOW]

I know what you mean, almost all the elk were using creek bottoms as travel corridors, I found elk in every creek I checked out.
Roosevelt elk seem to walk a lot slower than Rocky Mountain. When I hunted eastern Washington, you could hear them from a long ways away, but You can barely hear these Roosies.
It was a good season, I saw 78 elk, 3 deer, 9 grouse, a bear, a coyote, a porcupine, and 7 racoons,
should have taken 2 shots, but passed.
learned to bring the truck instead of the minivan.
And a tool set!
Next year I am bringing my fishing rod.
I also am going to clear a trail down behind a guys propety and have a stand there for the start of season.
At the guys property I have permission to hunt, I am going to "salt" it and set up a camera and stand.
I am going to get a "game Cart" so I can pack one further and get into unit a little deeper.
Bring my bike.
Set up camp near lake in middle of August and keep scouting.

[STIKNSTRINGBOW]

Also the 3pt bull only unit (Willapa Hills) was recommended by the locals. Less pressure and lots of elk!

[wingnut]

"Set up camp near lake in middle of August and keep scouting"

When I lived in Washington and hunted Roosies, we started the 4th of July and spent almost every weekend in the woods scouting.

Heck between fishing and mushrooms you can learn a lot about the elk and eat great.

Learn to ID a chantrelle, you'll be a very happy camper.

Mike

[Bowhntr]

I used to hunt near Ryderwood, great hunting around there but a lot of pressure. I cut my elk hunting teeth around Quinault, was a great place also until someone spread the word. Good luck with the rest of your season.