Speaker 1: As a guide and hunter, I've spent thousands of days
Speaker 1: in the field. This show is about translating my hard
Speaker 1: won experiences into tips and tactics they'll get you closer
Speaker 1: to your ultimate goal success in the field. I'm Remy Warren.
Speaker 1: This is Cutting the Distance. Welcome back everyone. This week
Speaker 1: we're kicking off our elk series and we're starting with
Speaker 1: what I'm dubbing Elk Wallows one oh one. Now, this
Speaker 1: podcast is going to be everything you need to know
Speaker 1: for locating and hunting elk wollos during the rut during September,
Speaker 1: one thing comes to mind and just rutting bowl elk.
Speaker 1: The cool thing about that is there's so many behaviors
Speaker 1: that you can key in on, and wallowing is one
Speaker 1: of them. They roll in the mud, they get stinky,
Speaker 1: they get fired up to gather up their cows, and
Speaker 1: that's a tactic that you can exploit. So I'm going
Speaker 1: to talk about how to use them for scouting and
Speaker 1: how they changed throughout the season. But first I want
Speaker 1: to share a funny story of when I was guiding
Speaker 1: a hunter and set them up on a wallow. This
Speaker 1: hunt takes place in the mountains of northern New Mexico
Speaker 1: and that late September early October time frame. Now I
Speaker 1: really enjoyed hunting this particular area because the elk tended
Speaker 1: to rut there a little bit later than other places
Speaker 1: in the country. So I'd be hunting and guiding in
Speaker 1: Montana and then I could go down to the spot
Speaker 1: in New Mexico and guide down there and still kind
Speaker 1: of extend that rut season get into some awesome elk
Speaker 1: hunting action. There was a pretty good bowled of cow
Speaker 1: ratio there, but the area was could be very difficult
Speaker 1: to hunt as well if the elk weren't being vocal
Speaker 1: or if they weren't running well, because it was just
Speaker 1: like a lot of timber, a lot of oak brush.
Speaker 1: Many of the parks and openings were buried in the trees,
Speaker 1: so they'd be like big pine forests around these kind
Speaker 1: of flatter meadows on the ridges, and you couldn't really
Speaker 1: glass them from anywhere. So the long range glassing and
Speaker 1: kind of figuring out where the elk were was difficult
Speaker 1: because there's so much timber, so you had to you
Speaker 1: had to hike around a lot, you had to move
Speaker 1: around a lot, you had to kind of judge sign
Speaker 1: and and find where the elk were, and then if
Speaker 1: they were vocal man, that just made it so much easier.
Speaker 1: But you know, as as the rut progressed and got
Speaker 1: a little bit later in the season, most of the
Speaker 1: bulls had their cows and they weren't making as much
Speaker 1: noise or for not as long. So I really had
Speaker 1: to employ a lot of other tactics just trying to
Speaker 1: locate where the elk we're at. On this particular week,
Speaker 1: I had a hunter that he hunted, but he was
Speaker 1: there with his family. He probably, i would say, out
Speaker 1: of the group of guys, he was the guy that
Speaker 1: was leased into it, not like the rest of us
Speaker 1: we're just consumed with hunting, thinking about it all the time.
Speaker 1: But you know, as a guide, you're used to that.
Speaker 1: There might be a couple of people that are there
Speaker 1: for different reasons. He was there to enjoy some time
Speaker 1: with his family and go on a hunt, and me,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm just on hunt, go hunt, go, go,
Speaker 1: go go go, which is fine. You know, you get
Speaker 1: used to that, and that's part of the fun of
Speaker 1: guiding is being able to take out different hunters and
Speaker 1: and everything like that. So I'm taking him out and
Speaker 1: we're hunting, and you know, we're chasing the elk and
Speaker 1: trying to get into position, and about midway through the hunt,
Speaker 1: he's like, hey man, you know this is great. You
Speaker 1: know we're getting on more elk than anyone else. But
Speaker 1: he's like, I'm getting pretty tired. Is there any other options?
Speaker 1: And I'm like, yeah, I've got an idea because earlier
Speaker 1: that season, a couple of weeks prior, the bulls were
Speaker 1: bugling really well and they led us into this big
Speaker 1: timbered basin. It was like almost like I called it
Speaker 1: the Amphitheater. Just the shape of this hill is just
Speaker 1: you could hear the bulls in there and they would
Speaker 1: just be sounding off and it was echoing, and it
Speaker 1: was just one of those perfect spots to hear and
Speaker 1: chase elk when you can't get eyes on him. And
Speaker 1: during the course of chasing a bull in there, I
Speaker 1: found on this perfect wall. It was like the hill
Speaker 1: came down, it flattened out into this one little bench
Speaker 1: on a point, and for some reason, somehow collected water
Speaker 1: right on this flat spot and it was a perfectly
Speaker 1: tore up wallow right in the timber, and then it
Speaker 1: dropped down on both sides. On one side more pine forest,
Speaker 1: and then on the other side it was a pine
Speaker 1: forest mixed with this big aspens and a ton of
Speaker 1: trails going right to this wall. Is the perfect spot.
Speaker 1: So I just I, you know, I mentally made a
Speaker 1: note of that. I was like, this is this is
Speaker 1: a pretty hot spot. I feel like there was good
Speaker 1: amounts of elk in there a few weeks earlier. I figured, Okay, yep,
Speaker 1: I'll just set him on that wall the next day.
Speaker 1: So the next morning, I make a plan and I'm like, okay,
Speaker 1: we actually hunted in there the day before, and I
Speaker 1: saw the sign that was going in there, and I
Speaker 1: could tell, like you know, most of the water in
Speaker 1: there was pretty clean and this one was still murky.
Speaker 1: So I'm thinking, okay, the elk we're hitting this in
Speaker 1: the morning, we'd be pretty much just missed them. They
Speaker 1: weren't making an noise, but definitely a bull was coming
Speaker 1: in here hammering this thing and then moved off. Maybe
Speaker 1: it was a lone bull or whatever. Based on the tracks,
Speaker 1: I knew for a fact if we went back in
Speaker 1: there the next morning and sat it, a bull would
Speaker 1: come in. So make that play tomorrow morning. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: set you. So I cut a bunch of branches down
Speaker 1: and it was pretty tight in there where you could
Speaker 1: you could see the wallow, and then it kind of
Speaker 1: ducked down off both ridges on either side, so about
Speaker 1: fifty yards away or maybe even closer. I started cutting
Speaker 1: branches that I could find him built like this really
Speaker 1: nice blind out of the branches where he'd have a
Speaker 1: good shot. And this was actually a rifle season, so
Speaker 1: there plenty close, good opportunity, good lane right there, just
Speaker 1: had to stay hidden. And I figured, all right, tomorrow,
Speaker 1: I'll just bring in a chair and make it comfortable
Speaker 1: and this will be a good spot. So we go
Speaker 1: back the next morning. I bring one of those folding
Speaker 1: like collapsible camp chairs or whatever it, carry it all
Speaker 1: the way in there, get him set up, and I'm thinking,
Speaker 1: like I'm looking around and it's just it's a little
Speaker 1: too tight for two people. But I also figured, all right,
Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure and Elk's gonna come in here. But
Speaker 1: I also want to go around on this other side,
Speaker 1: the more open side, maybe try to glass in there,
Speaker 1: see if I can see elk, Like they're coming from somewhere,
Speaker 1: and the tracks came from that way the day before.
Speaker 1: So I'm thinking, maybe I can get eyes on this bowl,
Speaker 1: and if he doesn't come to this wallow, maybe I
Speaker 1: can see where he goes and we can figure it
Speaker 1: out that way. So I tell the hunter, I'm like,
Speaker 1: all right, I'm gonna set you here and I'm just
Speaker 1: gonna go a couple of miles around the mountain, get
Speaker 1: a goodvantage of where I'm thinking they're going to come from,
Speaker 1: and see if I can scout that out. But I'm like,
Speaker 1: I'm pretty positive. I said, if I had to bet money,
Speaker 1: I would bet that an Elk is gonna come hit
Speaker 1: this wallow this morning. And he's like, okay, really, I
Speaker 1: was like yeah, I was like, just I told him.
Speaker 1: He's like, well, you know, is there anything I should do?
Speaker 1: Tips whatever? And I said, my my only thing, just
Speaker 1: do not fall asleep. It's like, I will be back
Speaker 1: here at eleven thirty am. It's not that long. You know,
Speaker 1: you weren't gonna sit here all day. Just don't fall
Speaker 1: asleep right off the back because he's you know, based
Speaker 1: on the time we came in yesterday, he's probably gonna
Speaker 1: come in around that nine to ten thirty in the morning,
Speaker 1: probably earlier. And you know, just watch this wall He's like, okay, cool,
Speaker 1: and so I walk off and I'm thinking, okay, this
Speaker 1: is this is perfect. I get to my point over
Speaker 1: on the other side and start glassing in and I
Speaker 1: see a few cows going through and a good bull,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, oh man, this is this is awesome.
Speaker 1: So I'm watching him, watching him, and they go and
Speaker 1: then kind of disappear, but they're taking a trail that
Speaker 1: leads right to that wallow. I'm like, this is like
Speaker 1: a first sure deal. So I'm waiting and I'm like
Speaker 1: just kind of glassing in there and seeing if anything
Speaker 1: comes back, and like looking and I can see I'm
Speaker 1: thinking to myself, man, that bowl has to be in
Speaker 1: there somewhere. I saw the cows kind of come out,
Speaker 1: and then the bull never came back out. So I
Speaker 1: was like, man, I wonder if that bull just went
Speaker 1: to wall and the cows came back out to go
Speaker 1: bed somewhere else. You know, You're sitting there by yourself
Speaker 1: thinking of all the potential scenarios going on. But I'm like, well,
Speaker 1: he clearly didn't go to that wallow. So I'm waiting,
Speaker 1: and then a while longer I hear boom gun goes off.
Speaker 1: So I'm like, sweet, okay, dead bull. This is awesome.
Speaker 1: So I make my way around into the hunter and
Speaker 1: I get down to him and he's sitting there and
Speaker 1: I'm like, okay, where's the bull. He's like, well, he
Speaker 1: was right here and I shot and I don't know
Speaker 1: if I'm pretty sure I hit him and he probably
Speaker 1: just went over the edge here. He's like I had
Speaker 1: to have hit him. I'm thinking. I'm like okay, and
Speaker 1: I'm looking at where he shot, at the elk at
Speaker 1: and where he was sitting. So he's sitting like facing
Speaker 1: downhill and there's like one good open lane and then
Speaker 1: the trail that goes to the wallow, and then there's
Speaker 1: kind of like a trail that goes away from the
Speaker 1: wallow and then it drops down into this big, thick
Speaker 1: valley and just like really thick and nasty down there.
Speaker 1: And I'm like okay. I'm like, well, just before we
Speaker 1: go proceed, you know, like I want to know, like
Speaker 1: where'd you hit him. He's like, well, like right behind
Speaker 1: the shoulder, okay, so you should just be dead right here. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And I was like, okay, well, where was the elk
Speaker 1: standing because I'm looking around, I don't see any blood.
Speaker 1: He's like, oh, he's standing over here, and I and
Speaker 1: where he's pointing over. It's like not a real good shot.
Speaker 1: And just I'm trying to figure out. I'm like, I
Speaker 1: see some tracks. And so I asked him, like, okay,
Speaker 1: so like what happened? Did the elk just like cruise by?
Speaker 1: Did he come in? Did he wallow? He's like no, no,
Speaker 1: she just like the elk was just like right there
Speaker 1: and I shot him, and I'm thinking, I'm like, just
Speaker 1: the story is not adding up because he should have
Speaker 1: had like an easy close shot. So I was like,
Speaker 1: so he didn't wal you guys like, no, he didn't walk. Okay,
Speaker 1: So did you have a broadside shot? Yeah? Yeah, I
Speaker 1: had a broadside shot. But I was like, well, how
Speaker 1: did you get a broadside show over here through the trees?
Speaker 1: I just couldn't put two and two together. And I
Speaker 1: started thinking about it and I was like, I don't
Speaker 1: really care, but I'm just trying to like piece things
Speaker 1: together so we so we know how to proceed because
Speaker 1: I'm not really finding good evidence, Like if you hit
Speaker 1: him where you said, then you'd just be right down here.
Speaker 1: But if you maybe made a bad shot. I don't
Speaker 1: want to push him, like I just I'm trying to
Speaker 1: build this out so we don't leave a potentially wounded
Speaker 1: elk on the mountain or do something wrong. And so
Speaker 1: I was like, so he didn't come to the wall,
Speaker 1: he was here, was he moving? Well? No, he wasn't. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: he was kind of moving okay. And so I'm trying
Speaker 1: to piece this together. And I was like, hey, just
Speaker 1: so I know, did you fall asleep? It's like, no,
Speaker 1: I did not fall asleep. Because I'm looking and I
Speaker 1: see some tracks and I see like the wallow looks
Speaker 1: pretty freshly used. I was like, I don't care. But
Speaker 1: I was like, I just I'm just trying to figure
Speaker 1: out the whole story here so I can piece it together,
Speaker 1: so I can see as I what's going on to
Speaker 1: make the right move to find this bowl. And he's like, no,
Speaker 1: I did not fall asleep. I'm my gosh, just it
Speaker 1: just seemed weird way to stand on a trail for
Speaker 1: an olk to be broadside there. I'm like, you sure
Speaker 1: you didn't fall asleep? Yeah, I swear. He's like, I
Speaker 1: swear to god, I didn't fall asleep. I was like okay,
Speaker 1: So I go and I look, and he didn't know.
Speaker 1: But I had a trail cam set up on that
Speaker 1: wallow on a tree out of you, and I guess
Speaker 1: I just forgot to tell him that it was there.
Speaker 1: So I'm like, okay. So I walk over to the
Speaker 1: trail camera and I go to review the pictures, and
Speaker 1: sure enough, the elk had come in. It actually came in,
Speaker 1: got a drink, and then bedded down right next to
Speaker 1: the wallow. Then it got up, got another drink, got
Speaker 1: in the wallow, rolled around like milled around the thing,
Speaker 1: and then wallowed again. The elk was there for like
Speaker 1: ten or fifteen minutes, maybe even more, like doing its thing,
Speaker 1: and then it's like the elk like wallowed again a
Speaker 1: last time and then got up. In the last picture
Speaker 1: I see is like this elk moving. It looked like
Speaker 1: I was moving pretty quick after that. So my assumption
Speaker 1: was he had fallen asleep. I would have been there
Speaker 1: sleeping for a very long time while this elk is
Speaker 1: like rolling around in the wallow maybe forty five yards
Speaker 1: away doing its thing, like bedded down right next to him,
Speaker 1: and he was in the blind must have fallen asleep.
Speaker 1: Woke up, probably scared him to see this elk there.
Speaker 1: Then the elk saw him, you know, he probably rushed,
Speaker 1: grabbed his gun, through his gun up shot. And then
Speaker 1: I started like looking around. I was like, okay, now
Speaker 1: I understand the picture of what potentially happened. You know,
Speaker 1: it's like this rush probably surprised this elks real close,
Speaker 1: freaks out, grabs the gun, throws the gun up, shoots.
Speaker 1: I started looking around, and now with that knowledge in mind,
Speaker 1: I start looking in different places, and sure enough, like
Speaker 1: right after where I lost the picture of the elk
Speaker 1: and it looked like it was running, I look and
Speaker 1: there's like some a bunch of trees right there. I
Speaker 1: look closer to where the blind was and I see
Speaker 1: the bullet hole like in a tree. So the guy
Speaker 1: had missed the elk, which was good. He'd just thrown
Speaker 1: the gun up and shot and hit a tree fairly
Speaker 1: close to where, you know, I think out of panic,
Speaker 1: probably wasn't even looking down the scope. But it completely
Speaker 1: didn't line up with the story I was given. Now,
Speaker 1: if we're gonna talk about wallow hunting, we should first
Speaker 1: just kind of define what a wallow is. So a wallow,
Speaker 1: I mean by definition really is just an area of
Speaker 1: mud or shallow water where there's a depression that's been
Speaker 1: made from you know, large mammals using it over time.
Speaker 1: A lot of different species use wallows. Water buffaloes use them.
Speaker 1: You see them out in the floodplains of Australia asiatic
Speaker 1: water buffaloes or in Africa. A lot of animals use
Speaker 1: wallows to cool down to get wet, you know, like
Speaker 1: even during the summer. Bears will use wallows to cool down,
Speaker 1: to just lay in, to relax and moose um. A
Speaker 1: lot of different animals will use these wallows. Now, the
Speaker 1: way elk use wallows changes over time, so let's kind
Speaker 1: of dive into first how elk use wallows, because it
Speaker 1: changes from right now in August through the end of
Speaker 1: September beginning of October. That wallow is going to go
Speaker 1: through some life cycles. Now, you can think of it
Speaker 1: like this. You go into the woods and let's say
Speaker 1: you find a wallow today. You'll know it because it's
Speaker 1: it's probably in this round or oval shape. It's in
Speaker 1: an area that it's holding maybe a few inches of water,
Speaker 1: kind of got like a silty, muddy bottom, and you
Speaker 1: look at it and you go, okay, this is definitely
Speaker 1: somewhere where elk of wallow. Maybe there's even like some
Speaker 1: small conifer trees, some small pines that have been ripped up. Whatever.
Speaker 1: You go, okay, this is definitely a wallow. But at
Speaker 1: that time of year, that wall is probably more used
Speaker 1: as either for cooling down or primarily drinking water hole.
Speaker 1: The difference between a water hole and a wallow is
Speaker 1: what goes on in the water. So a water hole,
Speaker 1: you know, you wouldn't call a stream a wallow, even
Speaker 1: though it's a water source, because it's primarily used for drinking,
Speaker 1: whereas a small even like a wallow other times a
Speaker 1: year you'd probably call a water hole because it's not
Speaker 1: necessarily used for laying in, cooling off, what have you. Now,
Speaker 1: what I like to do is, you know, over the
Speaker 1: course of scouting or whatever, I'll actually put trail cameras
Speaker 1: or if it's legal, on these wallows and see what's
Speaker 1: coming to them. And for the most part, what you
Speaker 1: see is you see elk drinking out of them. Uh,
Speaker 1: maybe a few you know, younger elk whatever laying in it,
Speaker 1: maybe some muse ling in, lots of bears laying in it,
Speaker 1: and then primarily elk using it to drink. Now, how's
Speaker 1: that change over the course of September. Well, what happens
Speaker 1: is the way bull elk wallow is they use the
Speaker 1: wallow not as a drinking source or not as cooling off,
Speaker 1: but as a perfume station. So as the rut starts
Speaker 1: to progress, as we move from summer into fall, you know,
Speaker 1: the elk are gonna start gathering up harems. The cows
Speaker 1: are normally in groups. They could be in large groups,
Speaker 1: but probably in smaller little groups, and the bulls will
Speaker 1: start to gather those up in a mass. More cows
Speaker 1: in these groups that will create this harem. Now the
Speaker 1: bulls find these harems, oftentimes vocally, so they'll start bugling.
Speaker 1: It will primarily be the smaller, younger bulls that will
Speaker 1: bugle first. Then they'll start rounding up cows, whereas the bigger,
Speaker 1: mature bulls are going to use that conserve that energy
Speaker 1: from when that rut kicks off, they're gonna go in there.
Speaker 1: They're gonna let the little ones round everything up, and
Speaker 1: they're just gonna go in there and probably take them.
Speaker 1: But elk also use scents and pheromones to attract cows
Speaker 1: to tract mates, to gather harems to identify their location.
Speaker 1: They also do things like markings raking trees. I mean,
Speaker 1: if you're a white tail hunter, you'll understand this because
Speaker 1: you've got your scrapes, which are really just dear buck
Speaker 1: pheromone stations, and bucks set those out as like traps
Speaker 1: to attract females, and they have their kind of routes
Speaker 1: and they can find females that way. Whereas a bull elk,
Speaker 1: it's pheromone station is on its body, so the elk
Speaker 1: will use the wallow to essentially hold its scent, to
Speaker 1: hold its perfume, to hold its pheromones. So when it's
Speaker 1: out walking through the woods, the cows can smell it.
Speaker 1: When it's bugling and trying to assert dominance, the other
Speaker 1: elk can smell it. It's got it's scraper, it's it's pheromone,
Speaker 1: it's male masculine perfume all over it, and the wallow
Speaker 1: helps hold and disperse that scent. So as the rep progresses,
Speaker 1: these water holes become bull elk wallows by elk rolling
Speaker 1: in them, urinating in them, spreading their scent, and then
Speaker 1: they'll rule in that mud and that mud is gonna
Speaker 1: stick to their hair, and then that's gonna hold whatever
Speaker 1: scents and pheromones they're trying to keep on them. So
Speaker 1: when they're walking through the woods, they're the loudest, stinkiest,
Speaker 1: nastiest creature they can be, which in turn attracts the ladies.
Speaker 1: The wallow is the elks axe body spray, if you
Speaker 1: can believe it or not. So once they've got all
Speaker 1: wallowed up, then they'll go around, they'll do their displays,
Speaker 1: they'll call, maybe they'll challengeable. Maybe they've got a harem
Speaker 1: and their hare UM's bedded down the walk over, they'll wallow.
Speaker 1: They'll get all perfumed up to let them know, hey,
Speaker 1: I'm still here, I'm still the man. I'm in charge
Speaker 1: of this group. And that's how Elk used these wallows
Speaker 1: during the rut. Now, after the rut gets over, you know,
Speaker 1: you start getting into later fall, and those wallows start
Speaker 1: to clear out, they'll stop using them. Maybe some will
Speaker 1: use them in in arid areas as water sources again.
Speaker 1: But during that rut period, during that I would say
Speaker 1: beginning of September through maybe the first week of October,
Speaker 1: those are being used as scent stations. For bulls. Identifying
Speaker 1: and finding wallows can be a little tricky because there's
Speaker 1: certain things you need to look for, and they can
Speaker 1: be kind of pinpointed on a map, and some of
Speaker 1: them you'll just find. The best wallows I found are
Speaker 1: just ones that you kind of randomly find while you're
Speaker 1: out there scouting looking around, that are in places mid mountain,
Speaker 1: places near bedding areas that you think, man, that's crazy
Speaker 1: that there's just this little water source right here. But
Speaker 1: when you really start to analyze it, you can kind
Speaker 1: of figure out a basis of where these wallows are
Speaker 1: going to be. So what makes a perfect wallow is
Speaker 1: something that has a sandy or muddy bottom, not necessarily sandy,
Speaker 1: but like a more muddy bottom, silty bottom, shallow, and
Speaker 1: it's probably gonna be in a flat spot where it
Speaker 1: has less rock because rocky doesn't really hold that silt.
Speaker 1: It's just not as good. So places that contain walls regularly,
Speaker 1: it would be parks and meadows, like any riparian area.
Speaker 1: You could even follow streams and around beaver dams or
Speaker 1: where areas where they flatten out. Another good spot where
Speaker 1: you find my favorite kind of walls, just like these
Speaker 1: little pockets. It's just a perfect wallow. On the hillside.
Speaker 1: It's generally off the side of a catchment or toward
Speaker 1: the top of let's say a basin. So you've got
Speaker 1: like this basin maybe where the snow melts gonna come
Speaker 1: down and it forms a creek. So I look off
Speaker 1: the creeks in any places where the hill starts to flat. Now,
Speaker 1: so up on the hillside above a creek where it
Speaker 1: might be steep, and then you get this sharp flat spot.
Speaker 1: What that happens to do is the water traveling underground
Speaker 1: kind of settles there before moving fully down to the creek.
Speaker 1: It catches it. And those are really good spots as well.
Speaker 1: So you can look on your topo map you start
Speaker 1: looking for riparian areas. I kind of think of wallows
Speaker 1: in two ways. They're either kind of high or they're low.
Speaker 1: So in the bottoms of the creeks where maybe it's
Speaker 1: steep all around, it starts to flatten out. Maybe you've
Speaker 1: got a meadow with a creek going into it. That'll
Speaker 1: start getting some muddy spots where elk will create these wallows.
Speaker 1: And then my favorite ones would be, you know, finding
Speaker 1: maybe a river catchment where a stream's coming down, not
Speaker 1: necessarily a river, but just a mountain stream where there's
Speaker 1: definitely run off in the middle. And then looking at
Speaker 1: the topography lines on your map, and while you're out
Speaker 1: there and finding somewhere where maybe that flattens out up
Speaker 1: on the hill above or in that same catchment, anywhere
Speaker 1: where you go from steep to flat to then steep again,
Speaker 1: you're probably going to find water pooling in those places,
Speaker 1: and elk will utilize that as well as kind of
Speaker 1: the heads of some of these smaller streams and creeks.
Speaker 1: Once you've identified that, you know, when I'm out there,
Speaker 1: I I look for potential wallow spots. When I'm scouting
Speaker 1: a new area, I look for potential wallow spots on
Speaker 1: my onyx. I start marking potential wallows. Then when I
Speaker 1: go out there and proof it, you know, finding the
Speaker 1: exact wallow is a little bit more difficult when you're
Speaker 1: out there, but then you know, I'll market on the
Speaker 1: onyx while I'm in the field and just keep those
Speaker 1: wallows in mind. Now, if I'm doing that earlier, it's
Speaker 1: hard to say which one is going to be the
Speaker 1: wallow during the season, because not every water hole becomes
Speaker 1: a wallow, and not every wallow is a good water
Speaker 1: hole earlier in season, so you have to kind of
Speaker 1: start marking a bunch of them and then start checking
Speaker 1: as that September starts to progress, which one's going to
Speaker 1: be used, because you might be in one area that
Speaker 1: will have ten fifteen little water holes, springs, other things
Speaker 1: that could be used a wallow. I guess I forgot
Speaker 1: to mention that identifying springs on the map a really
Speaker 1: good way to find wall as many of those springs
Speaker 1: may become wallows as the season progresses, so those are
Speaker 1: also areas that I key on. So I'm just looking
Speaker 1: for potential wallows in the summertime or you know, in
Speaker 1: this August period if you have time, and then as
Speaker 1: the rut starts to kick off, I'll go back to
Speaker 1: those and I'll start checking those wallows again, really using
Speaker 1: my nose to identify and looking for ones that look
Speaker 1: like they've had use, ones that maybe a lot of them.
Speaker 1: In that air. You're clear in one's muddy, so that
Speaker 1: really tells me, Okay, something was rolling around in here.
Speaker 1: You'll start to smell in the heat of the day,
Speaker 1: ones that are getting hit and used more will start
Speaker 1: to reek like elk. Those are the ones that I
Speaker 1: key on during the season. If you can place the
Speaker 1: trail camera there or whatever, that's a great way to
Speaker 1: just say, okay, is this one being used? How often
Speaker 1: is it being used? The ones that smell the worst
Speaker 1: are going to be the ones that are getting hit
Speaker 1: the hardest. Now, I will say understanding wallows is really
Speaker 1: important to understanding how to hunt them later on. Once
Speaker 1: you've identified wallows in an area during the seasons during September,
Speaker 1: you're you're probably gonna see certain things happen. The bigger
Speaker 1: bulls will start to hit those wallows harder as the
Speaker 1: rep progresses. You'll probably be smaller, i would say, more
Speaker 1: immature bulls hitting them real early in the season, and
Speaker 1: then the bigger bulls really hammering them and taking them
Speaker 1: over later in the season. So you know, it could
Speaker 1: also be a factor of maybe some of those bigger
Speaker 1: bulls are just going to use them as water hole
Speaker 1: until they really start to wallow and really get into
Speaker 1: that act of trying to attract to the females. But
Speaker 1: either way, they can be a really valuable resource on
Speaker 1: where to pinpoint, locate and maybe start your hunt from
Speaker 1: so now let's get to ways to hunt wallows. I
Speaker 1: think of it two ways. You can either ambush on
Speaker 1: a wallow, or you can use an area with lots
Speaker 1: of wallows to start your approach, to start your hunt,
Speaker 1: to focus in on a particular area. Using the ambush method,
Speaker 1: what I do is I preseason like to scout a
Speaker 1: lot of different wallows and if it's legal, set up
Speaker 1: some cameras and understand, okay, what's using these wallows when
Speaker 1: then as the season progresses, maybe starting the first couple
Speaker 1: week in September, whatever, I'll recheck those walls and see
Speaker 1: which ones are getting hit year after year. There's some
Speaker 1: that always get hit, and then there's some that go dry.
Speaker 1: There's some that maybe it's a perfect wallow, but they're
Speaker 1: using one three yards down the valley, down the rid,
Speaker 1: maybe on the other side of the meadow. That one
Speaker 1: seems to be getting hit more. I find the one
Speaker 1: that seems to be getting the most use, and that's
Speaker 1: where all set up either tree stand, ground blind like
Speaker 1: a pop up ground blind, or just a makeshift blind.
Speaker 1: If you've got an area where you can use a
Speaker 1: tree stand, I think that that's probably one of the
Speaker 1: better options. I've I've done everything, ground blinds, homemade blinds,
Speaker 1: tree stands. You know, sometimes you're just so far back
Speaker 1: there and it's just not practical to carry a tree stand.
Speaker 1: So I generally, in that in that instance go with
Speaker 1: cutting and making my own ground blind I mean a
Speaker 1: lot of it with elk is just being very still
Speaker 1: in having the wind right and those wallows. Even if
Speaker 1: the wind starts to swirl a little bit, the scent
Speaker 1: from the wall sometimes overpowers your own scent. This is
Speaker 1: where you know, I talked about elk hunting and scent control,
Speaker 1: and you in the Mountain West, you know you'ren't really
Speaker 1: so concerned about scent control. But if you're gonna be sitting,
Speaker 1: you know, bringing some kind of scent control spray or
Speaker 1: whatever isn't a bad option. I don't like to use
Speaker 1: cover some because I think it disrupts my nose from
Speaker 1: smelling things that I need to smell when I'm out
Speaker 1: there hunting. If I can smell an elk before I
Speaker 1: see them, that's good. So if you're gonna sit, think
Speaker 1: of it like white tail hunting. A lot of the
Speaker 1: tactics once you're in that tree sitting are very similar
Speaker 1: to white tail hunting, and then at that point it's
Speaker 1: just a patience game, and the key is to try
Speaker 1: to stay away and not fall asleep while in elk's
Speaker 1: rolling around in the meadow in front of you. But
Speaker 1: that's not always easy to do, so for me, I
Speaker 1: I do a combination that I've sat wallows and had
Speaker 1: a lot of success. I've used wallows a lot, especially
Speaker 1: for guiding where it's just a more controlled environment. I
Speaker 1: wouldn't say that they're guaranteed, but it's very likely that
Speaker 1: if you put in the time and you find the
Speaker 1: right wallow, you're gonna find success because the elk are
Speaker 1: coming to you and you may get actually a better
Speaker 1: opportunity at those bigger mature bulls, especially like peak rut
Speaker 1: the third week in September to maybe the last week
Speaker 1: in September, maybe they aren't going to be moving away
Speaker 1: from those harems as much. So if you can hindpoint
Speaker 1: that wallow, that's a really good way to target a
Speaker 1: herd bowl, And if that's what you're looking for, that
Speaker 1: might be your best opportunity to targeting a specific bowl
Speaker 1: in a specific area. There's places that I hunt a
Speaker 1: lot that trail cameras you aren't allowed to use during
Speaker 1: the season. So what I do to identify wallows then
Speaker 1: is I try to take a stick or something and
Speaker 1: I'll place it in the wall, and then I'll take
Speaker 1: a picture on my phone and I'll go back and
Speaker 1: recheck that and see if that area was disturbed. If
Speaker 1: it was disturbed or there's new mud around, then I
Speaker 1: know that that wall is being used. The thing about
Speaker 1: sitting a wallow is can really use them any time
Speaker 1: of day. They might use them in the middle of
Speaker 1: the day. Sometimes they're most likely to use them first
Speaker 1: thing in the morning or or before the evening really
Speaker 1: kicks off. But I also find them using wallows a
Speaker 1: lot during that midday where they push the cows to bed.
Speaker 1: Once that bull gets up from his bed, he'll walk
Speaker 1: straight to that wallow, wallow around, then go back in
Speaker 1: the cows and stir him up for a little bit
Speaker 1: of ace around, a little bit of grab bass, like
Speaker 1: right before the evening when they start pushing him out again.
Speaker 1: So if you decide, hey, I want to sit a wallow,
Speaker 1: you know, think of it as an all day investment
Speaker 1: unless you have proof of when they're using it a
Speaker 1: lot via trail camera or other intel. Another way to
Speaker 1: tell if a wall has been used a lot. It
Speaker 1: is just like going in and seeing, Okay, what's the
Speaker 1: water coloration. Is this normally a clear wallow and it's
Speaker 1: muddy right now? Well, now I know that an elk
Speaker 1: has been in here, and understanding that is what I
Speaker 1: do when I'm just in an area and I decide
Speaker 1: not to do an ambush tactic, but I use the
Speaker 1: wallows as a jump off point. So I'll just break
Speaker 1: down one particular area that I hunt a lot. There's
Speaker 1: a good amount of wallows that you know, over the years,
Speaker 1: I've done many things with I've Sadam, I've you know,
Speaker 1: done this tactic where I go in and I just
Speaker 1: kind of use those wallows as a start off point.
Speaker 1: I start off calling into the area and maybe I
Speaker 1: get a bowl going whatever, then I'm going to go
Speaker 1: with that option of calling. Now, if I don't get
Speaker 1: that bowl, the call, maybe they're they're quiet, but I
Speaker 1: know I've seen elk in there, maybe I've spotted them
Speaker 1: before or whatever. It's thicker timber. I'm gonna now still
Speaker 1: hunt to each of those wallows, and I'm gonna I'm
Speaker 1: gonna slowly move into the wallows. I'm gonna use some
Speaker 1: cow calls and other things. I'm gonna be glassing and
Speaker 1: moving slow and anticipating, looking around like there's an elk
Speaker 1: on the wallow, and then looking around four elk as well.
Speaker 1: I'll have the kind of a route where I've pinpointed
Speaker 1: multiple wallows on this what I call my walk or
Speaker 1: my hunt. I go to that first wallow, I look
Speaker 1: no elk at that wall I'm gonna analyze the wallot
Speaker 1: wasn't used today? Isn't muddy? Maybe I placed a stick
Speaker 1: on it or something to decipher whether it's been used.
Speaker 1: Maybe it could have been used at night. Does it
Speaker 1: look fresh? Does it smell strong? What are the cues here?
Speaker 1: Is there an elk around here? If there is, then
Speaker 1: I can kind of continue to still hunt calls set up. Maybe.
Speaker 1: If not, then I slowly still hunt to the next one.
Speaker 1: Doing this, I've found elk. Like I've called elk in
Speaker 1: the wallows, I've also caught elk in between in these
Speaker 1: routes and areas around. It's also a good place to
Speaker 1: start my calling from. It can be a really good
Speaker 1: tactic as well, when you know there's elk there, but
Speaker 1: it's just maybe the conditions got hot and they aren't
Speaker 1: really making a lot of noise during the day. That
Speaker 1: doesn't mean that these elk have stopped running. You might
Speaker 1: be figuring out, okay, well, they're hitting a lot of
Speaker 1: these wallows at night, they're running a lot at night,
Speaker 1: they're being quiet in the daytime, But that still tells
Speaker 1: me that they're around here somewhere. They're using this as
Speaker 1: a jump off point, and they probably aren't going real far.
Speaker 1: It gives me an area at a pinpoint where I
Speaker 1: can still hunt, and then I can also set up
Speaker 1: and do some calling tactics where I'm calling to a
Speaker 1: quiet bowl. Where I might be calling to a bull
Speaker 1: that's cruising between cows. He's using these walls to perfume up.
Speaker 1: I can set up and throw out little cow calls,
Speaker 1: maybe a few bugles, and draw him to my location,
Speaker 1: even if he doesn't want to bugle back, or even
Speaker 1: if he's not being super responsive. It's also a good
Speaker 1: way to maybe move through the woods using col calls.
Speaker 1: Sometimes you can get those cows to respond to you
Speaker 1: and identify locations of where the bulls are going to be,
Speaker 1: even if the bulls aren't being vocal just by locating
Speaker 1: these areas where there's lots of wallows, understanding that these
Speaker 1: wallows are being used, and then hunting those areas and
Speaker 1: using that to kind of refine the places that you're
Speaker 1: searching for elk. If I were to give you some
Speaker 1: elk homework for the week, I think what you should
Speaker 1: start doing a good use of time. Let's say you
Speaker 1: don't have any time to scout. If you if you've
Speaker 1: got an elk hunt plant, start looking in those areas
Speaker 1: for potential riparian areas, springs, basins where there's creeks coming down,
Speaker 1: and it could even be side creeks where they flow
Speaker 1: into main creek. That's where up a little bit higher,
Speaker 1: look for those topographical lines where it's it's steep and
Speaker 1: flattens out, maybe the top of a little base and
Speaker 1: there's maybe some more flat areas, and start pinpointing potential wallows.
Speaker 1: You know, you could use your whatever you're mapping software
Speaker 1: on X or whatever and start marking those for when
Speaker 1: you get into the field if you have time to scout,
Speaker 1: check out and start locating verifying some walls, because it's
Speaker 1: really going to be a good position to be in,
Speaker 1: especially during in September. Maybe the elk aren't doing what
Speaker 1: you want, or maybe you find a big bull in
Speaker 1: an area and you're like, okay, I can't call him in.
Speaker 1: How do I pinpoint and focus on this animal? Hunting
Speaker 1: wallows is a huge tactic that you can keep in
Speaker 1: your back pocket and helps you be successful. So next
Speaker 1: week we're gonna continue with this elk stuff. Bust out
Speaker 1: your calls. If you've got an elk call, break it
Speaker 1: out next week. If you don't, well, order one this week.
Speaker 1: So I'm gonna go over. I'm actually gonna be I'm
Speaker 1: gonna try it. Hopefully I don't blow my microphone apart
Speaker 1: while bugling. I'm gonna have to kind of set up
Speaker 1: a room somehow where it sounds all right and don't
Speaker 1: get like two blown out or two echo e. My
Speaker 1: homework is to get a new microphone where I can
Speaker 1: do this with. But I'm gonna go over bugl ing
Speaker 1: and the escalation. How timing to fire up a bull
Speaker 1: really works because there's there as much to the sound
Speaker 1: as there is to the cadence and the timing. And
Speaker 1: I think you hear a lot of turkey hunters talk
Speaker 1: about that. Now, one thing I'm going to dispel is
Speaker 1: elk hunting is not like turkey hunting. When we start
Speaker 1: to call elk, we're not going to relate it to
Speaker 1: turkey hunting. Do you guys understand? Is everyone okay with that? Okay,
Speaker 1: it's just my rule. So when we talk elk, we're
Speaker 1: talking elk, weren't talking turkeys. No talking turkey. Um wow,
Speaker 1: that was just that was a massive side track to
Speaker 1: what I really wanted to say. I'm fired up and
Speaker 1: I'm gonna teach you how to fire up those bulls.
Speaker 1: So until next week now talking turkey. Bust those bugles out.
Speaker 1: See you later.