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. It's the middle of September
Speaker 1: and you find yourself in the elk woods. You've got
Speaker 1: a full week off work to chase bulls around. The
Speaker 1: area you're hunting is a little bit thicker, but unfortunately
Speaker 1: the elker not making a peep, no bugles to be heard.
Speaker 1: You know the bulls are there, but you just can't
Speaker 1: get them to respond. What do you do? Are these
Speaker 1: elks so callable? The answers yes, And I want to
Speaker 1: go through this week on the effective ways to call
Speaker 1: to silent bulls, everything from picking a spot through targeting
Speaker 1: loaner elk, as well as the calls to make and
Speaker 1: the tools that will help you accomplish the illusion of
Speaker 1: a herd of cows that will get a loan bull
Speaker 1: to come in and investigate. Now, when I started guiding
Speaker 1: elk hunters, one of the things that I found was
Speaker 1: you really had to call in elk every week, whether
Speaker 1: the helk wanted to cooperate or not, and sometimes that
Speaker 1: felt impossible. There were weeks where you would bugle and
Speaker 1: bugle and bugle and nothing would respond. Now that could
Speaker 1: be because you're hunting too early and the rut hasn't
Speaker 1: kicked off yet, or it could just be that the
Speaker 1: area you're hunting has had a lot of pressure, or
Speaker 1: the bulls are just quiet, or maybe you're running later
Speaker 1: after the rut. So I started to really investigate this
Speaker 1: and try a lot of different tactics, and I found
Speaker 1: one that became extremely successful for hauling in elk when
Speaker 1: nothing wanted to make a sound. Started really when I
Speaker 1: was guiding down in New Mexico. The area I was
Speaker 1: hunting was pretty thick. There wasn't a lot of glassing,
Speaker 1: and there really wasn't a lot of spots to cover.
Speaker 1: It was a lot of private land and smaller parcels.
Speaker 1: So I had to figure out ways to draw the
Speaker 1: elk to where we were because we couldn't just bash
Speaker 1: through every bit of country in hopes of finding them,
Speaker 1: especially when they weren't making noise. I kind of developed
Speaker 1: this tactic of calling to those loan bulls, those bulls
Speaker 1: that are cruising for cows. Those are also the bulls
Speaker 1: that are least likely to bugle back. He may not
Speaker 1: have his a harem of cows, he's just cruising. What
Speaker 1: he's looking for is a group of elk that's already there.
Speaker 1: So I wanted to figure out ways to target those elk,
Speaker 1: those bulls that are just cruising for ladies. And the
Speaker 1: way to do that is through setting up an illusion
Speaker 1: of creating a herd of cows. One story that really
Speaker 1: stands out in my mind. I was guiding in New
Speaker 1: Mexico and I had one of those weeks that just
Speaker 1: nothing seemed to be going right. I could tell that
Speaker 1: bulls were hitting this meadow in the dark, but nothing
Speaker 1: would make a peep and nothing would come out during
Speaker 1: daylight hours. I could also tell that the elk we're
Speaker 1: using this particular wallow. I decided, Okay, the elk are
Speaker 1: coming from the timbered area to the west, and this
Speaker 1: wallows right on the edge of the timber and then
Speaker 1: it enters into a feeding area. I get to see
Speaker 1: one in daylight hours. But I thought, why don't I
Speaker 1: create an illusion that there's a herd of elk cows
Speaker 1: out here and hopefully draw a bowl out of the
Speaker 1: timber where I could tell the tracks are coming in
Speaker 1: and out of. I was assuming that if he's gonna
Speaker 1: go to the herd of elk, he'll probably hit this
Speaker 1: wallow first, he'll get mudded up, he'll get sent it up,
Speaker 1: and then come in hot trying to impress the gals.
Speaker 1: So I put him up in a tree stand that
Speaker 1: I set up over the wallow, because I figured, well,
Speaker 1: even in while I'm calling, he can have a better
Speaker 1: vantage from the tree stand and might just catch an
Speaker 1: elk that's cruising to wallow or even drink because it
Speaker 1: was fairly hot as well. And then I would go
Speaker 1: a little bit further out and start cow calling. So
Speaker 1: I started in the morning hitting a few cow calls,
Speaker 1: and I had a whole slew of different cow calls,
Speaker 1: everything from diaphragm calls to open read calls, as well
Speaker 1: as some of those squeeze button calls might even have
Speaker 1: like a hoochie mama call. And then one of the
Speaker 1: carlton thought what it was at a button call or
Speaker 1: they call it something like that in my pockets because
Speaker 1: what I wanted to do is sound like a bunch
Speaker 1: of different elk at once. So the morning starts out,
Speaker 1: I give him my bugles just to make sure there's
Speaker 1: no bowls around. Nothing replying, same as it's been the
Speaker 1: last few days. So I decided to w in my
Speaker 1: cow call sequence, hitting some mus standard elk talk, me
Speaker 1: going off few of those little pocket calls. Nothing all right,
Speaker 1: but I'm intentionally calling to a bull that I'm assuming
Speaker 1: is gonna come in quiet. I'm trying to call to
Speaker 1: the loan bowl that i'd cut tracks of that i'm
Speaker 1: hoping is looking for cows. The morning progresses, it's starting
Speaker 1: to get hot and nothing has shown up. So I'm
Speaker 1: going to divulge a little secret. And this is something
Speaker 1: I rarely do. I started dozing off in between sets
Speaker 1: of cow calls because for two reasons, One I was
Speaker 1: pretty tired, and two I just get so impatient. I
Speaker 1: am not good at sitting there just being patient and calling.
Speaker 1: Take a little nap, and in between falling asleep, I
Speaker 1: would wake up, hit a few calls, go back to sleep.
Speaker 1: That just kept me from overcalling. Really, so I'm in
Speaker 1: between call sets, I'm laying there. The sun's hitting me,
Speaker 1: like man, there's definitely not going to be any elk right, now,
Speaker 1: but there's really nothing else we can do, so I'll
Speaker 1: just keep calling. I opened my eyes just slightly. I
Speaker 1: look off. As I opened my eyes, there is an
Speaker 1: elks foot within half an arm's length of my head.
Speaker 1: I could just literally reach my right arm out and
Speaker 1: grab this bull. I look up and this bull is
Speaker 1: directly over me. That elk knew exactly where those calls
Speaker 1: were coming from. He had pinpointed the exact location where
Speaker 1: I was calling from yet and walked right to me. Now,
Speaker 1: the trouble is, I've never had this happen, and I
Speaker 1: have a bull. His head is literally right above my head.
Speaker 1: I'm worried that he's gonna freak out and start stomping
Speaker 1: on me. I do not want him to see my eyeballs,
Speaker 1: so I'm just squinting and partially freaking out, thinking that
Speaker 1: he is at any second going to realize something's wrong
Speaker 1: and stomped me. When I woke up, I must have
Speaker 1: rustled a little bit because he kind of tilted his
Speaker 1: head down. So he's got his head down and I
Speaker 1: can see his eyeball maybe three ft from my face,
Speaker 1: and he's got his head down and his eye he
Speaker 1: cocked his head sideways so he can look at me better,
Speaker 1: and I can just see his eye sort of bulging
Speaker 1: out of his head, and he's moving back and forth
Speaker 1: trying to figure out what the hell is at his feet.
Speaker 1: At this point, I'm literally just praying this thing does
Speaker 1: not smash me and trying to move, not move at all.
Speaker 1: I do not want to open my eyes. I'm just squinting.
Speaker 1: He probably felt or heard my heart beating out of
Speaker 1: my chest. He got a little antsy and trotted off,
Speaker 1: spun around again, looked back where I was. Continued to
Speaker 1: lay there until he moved off. Once he got out
Speaker 1: of sight, I'll let a few more cow calls out,
Speaker 1: snuck around, grabbed my hunter from the tree stand. Was like, dude,
Speaker 1: this big six point bull was just right here at
Speaker 1: that point. I didn't tell him that I was asleep,
Speaker 1: of course, but so he comes down. We work. Luckily
Speaker 1: the wind was good. I get him. We work into
Speaker 1: the wind, set up again, continue to call. This time
Speaker 1: he actually kind of button hooks around, just out of
Speaker 1: range of myself and the hunter. You say, fifty five yards,
Speaker 1: circles around, catches our wind and blows out. Now, while
Speaker 1: we did not get that bull, it taught me two
Speaker 1: really good lessons, one in patience and one and the
Speaker 1: fact that those elk no exactly where you're calling from,
Speaker 1: and that is going to play huge into the way
Speaker 1: that I set up my calling sequences for loan bulls.
Speaker 1: If you want to be successful calling to bulls that
Speaker 1: don't want to call back, it's all in the setup.
Speaker 1: You really have to understand the type of bull you're
Speaker 1: calling to, and then you can really pinpoint the location
Speaker 1: on where to start your calling because it is going
Speaker 1: to be a patience game and you aren't gonna get
Speaker 1: any verbal cues that that bull is going to come
Speaker 1: in because the bowl that you're calling to is going
Speaker 1: to be a solitary bull. Now you might think of
Speaker 1: him as a I would say a satellite bowl that
Speaker 1: might be in between herds. That doesn't mean that it
Speaker 1: couldn't be a big bull. It's just a bull that's
Speaker 1: by himself. So the time of year is going to
Speaker 1: be a factor. But also you really have to know
Speaker 1: what that bowl wants that you're calling to. The reason
Speaker 1: that he's not calling back is probably because he might
Speaker 1: be a little bit afraid that another bull will just
Speaker 1: round up his cows run him off or fight him off.
Speaker 1: What he wants to do is he wants to come
Speaker 1: in silent and investigate first. And that is actually the
Speaker 1: majority of the elk out there. It's not because that
Speaker 1: elk knows you're a hunter calling to him, it's because
Speaker 1: that's what that elk is doing if other elk are
Speaker 1: in his area. There's a lot of ways to pinpoint
Speaker 1: these loan bulls, and there's a few places that you
Speaker 1: can start your focus on. Let's say it's just been
Speaker 1: a hard week of hunting, the elk are not making noise. Okay,
Speaker 1: where are we going to start, Well, let's pick a time.
Speaker 1: Are you hunting a little bit earlier in the season.
Speaker 1: Do you believe that maybe they're really the peak rut
Speaker 1: hasn't kicked off yet, or are you hunting what should
Speaker 1: be the peak rut. Maybe they're just really hooping it
Speaker 1: up in the middle of the night, but during daylight
Speaker 1: hours they're making a noise. Let's start with early. Okay,
Speaker 1: what are some places that bulls will go by themselves.
Speaker 1: One of them is wallows. Now in areas where a
Speaker 1: lot of water, yeah, you might be able to sit
Speaker 1: a wallow, but he may not hit that wallow when
Speaker 1: you want, because you gotta understand what is a wallow well.
Speaker 1: A wallow is essentially a perfume factory for a bull
Speaker 1: elk during the rut. What they do is they urinate
Speaker 1: in that water, They roll around in the mud that
Speaker 1: holds their scent on them. It's a way that they
Speaker 1: mark their territory, mark their bodies, create a aroma that
Speaker 1: when they run into that herd, they look beefed up,
Speaker 1: they smell good, and they're going to take those ladies.
Speaker 1: But that's also an easy to target elk with this
Speaker 1: kind of strategy because he is ready to be entertained
Speaker 1: by your fake harem and got it. Another scenario is
Speaker 1: an area where you're seeing a lot of elk signed
Speaker 1: maybe around the edge of a feeding area. If you're
Speaker 1: hunting more timbered country, these open pockets, these open meadows
Speaker 1: are probably going to be the spots that the elk
Speaker 1: are goom be coming out at night. But if you
Speaker 1: aren't seeing there in the middle of the day, they're
Speaker 1: off in the timber. However, if you create the illusion
Speaker 1: that the elk are out there now, like I did
Speaker 1: on that New Mexico hunt, you have a higher likelihood
Speaker 1: of drawing a bull that's hanging out in the timber
Speaker 1: out to investigate. These are curious elk that you're calling to,
Speaker 1: and they want to slip in assess the situation, possibly
Speaker 1: pick off a cow to steal on their own with
Speaker 1: little to no confrontation. Now, it's not as fun as
Speaker 1: getting riled up bulls and bugling until your heart is content.
Speaker 1: I agree with that there is a patience element that
Speaker 1: really sucks, and it's hard to be patient in an
Speaker 1: area where you aren't sure if there's elk, So you
Speaker 1: really have to pick your setups so you're not wasting
Speaker 1: your time calling to nothing. Ways that you do that
Speaker 1: are areas where you expect a loan bulls to be
Speaker 1: in areas where you're seeing sign but you just are
Speaker 1: not seeing the animals during daylight hours. Another great spot
Speaker 1: to start calling to these loan bulls is areas where
Speaker 1: you smell elk use your nose to identify the location.
Speaker 1: That means that they're within an earshot oftentimes, but you
Speaker 1: might not be able to suss exactly where they are.
Speaker 1: It's always better to try to get them to come
Speaker 1: to you than blindly going to cover looking for them.
Speaker 1: So that's another great setup. And then the best setup
Speaker 1: is if you spot a loan bull moving on his own,
Speaker 1: that's the time to employ this tactic. Get to where
Speaker 1: he's going, create that cow sound, and then draw him in.
Speaker 1: Those those are the bulls that drawing on a string
Speaker 1: because you've visually seen him. Maybe you lose them in
Speaker 1: the timber, but you can create this illusion of a
Speaker 1: harem of cows to draw them in. So, now that
Speaker 1: we've covered the where to call, let's talk about the how.
Speaker 1: Let's set the scene. You are going to create a
Speaker 1: herd of elk. Now, I like to start a couple
Speaker 1: different ways. The first scenario is, if bulls aren't making noise,
Speaker 1: I'd like to let them think that, hey, we're just
Speaker 1: a bunch of ladies looking for a lover. There's no
Speaker 1: bull here, just a bunch of cows hanging out. And
Speaker 1: I start by throwing out cow chatter. Now, cows will
Speaker 1: talk throughout the day, a lot of times as they're moving,
Speaker 1: and then also even when they're just betted up. So
Speaker 1: if I find an area that looks good, I'm going
Speaker 1: to create the illusion of elk moving into the area
Speaker 1: and then set up in almost a betting type scenario,
Speaker 1: because it's gonna take a while for that elk to
Speaker 1: come in, and you need to make sure that you're
Speaker 1: there long enough for him to slip in before he
Speaker 1: figures out what's going on and leaves, and you don't
Speaker 1: want to leave before he has time to get there,
Speaker 1: Like in that story where I took the nap and
Speaker 1: then the elk just walks right to me. I gave
Speaker 1: it ample time that I probably would not have done
Speaker 1: had I just gotten patient like I normally do and
Speaker 1: walked off and tried another spot. So I like to
Speaker 1: create the illusion of elk moving into an area talking
Speaker 1: to each other. That's just basic, muse It's not a
Speaker 1: lot of activity. It's just a lot of you back
Speaker 1: and forth. I got a little call here. I'll just
Speaker 1: give you a few examples, and this is gonna be.
Speaker 1: You're gonna do this while walking in and then you're
Speaker 1: gonna set up elk talking throughout the day. Maybe give
Speaker 1: it a few hours if you really think that this
Speaker 1: is where a bowl should be and you don't really
Speaker 1: have any better options. Nothing's making noise, and you're in
Speaker 1: an area where you can't really glass it. This is
Speaker 1: a great set up in mornings and evenings, especially on
Speaker 1: the edge of say a feeding area or moving into
Speaker 1: a betting area near where wallows will be. So here's
Speaker 1: gonna be the first example. We're just walking in, we're
Speaker 1: moving along, and we're just a couple of elk talking
Speaker 1: to each other. One of the tactics is just changing
Speaker 1: the direction that you're throwing those calls out. Sometimes I'll
Speaker 1: even have a couple of different types of calls, maybe
Speaker 1: an open read call or a diaphragm call, throwing out
Speaker 1: different sounds in different directions. This sound like multiple animals
Speaker 1: moving through the woods. I'll give it a little bit
Speaker 1: and then I'll get set up in an area where
Speaker 1: I'm going to create the illusion of a group of
Speaker 1: cows interacting with each other. This is gonna be in
Speaker 1: hopes to draw bull in to that particular location. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna pick that location down wind of where I'm assuming
Speaker 1: the bull will come from. And that's really important because
Speaker 1: a lot of times when they come in, they're gonna
Speaker 1: try to circle and catch your wind or smell the
Speaker 1: elk first. So you really want a good set up
Speaker 1: and really decipher, Okay, what's the best location where a
Speaker 1: bull would be and how do I put myself down
Speaker 1: wind of there to start my stationary calling. So we
Speaker 1: get set up, and what I like to do is
Speaker 1: I like to throw out a few more aggressive what
Speaker 1: I would consider the aggressive side of cow calls, something
Speaker 1: like cow's talking, but also maybe a lead cow barking
Speaker 1: directions or even an estrus wine a little bit longer,
Speaker 1: more drawn out cow call, because that can get the
Speaker 1: bull a little more curious. Another thing that I will
Speaker 1: throw out, aside from cow calls is even a short
Speaker 1: spike bugles, something they just kind of says, I wonder
Speaker 1: what the hell is going on over there, but not
Speaker 1: so much that thinks M I don't really want to
Speaker 1: deal with that right now. Oh h oh. Now, when
Speaker 1: I first get set up, I'll talk a lot. Throughout
Speaker 1: the period of time, I'll stop, I'll give a few
Speaker 1: calls here and there, and then ease up, because what
Speaker 1: you want to do is hopefully catches attention, but make
Speaker 1: him want to investigate. If the bull doesn't come in
Speaker 1: right away, very often will a bull walk in silent
Speaker 1: right away? However, you have to remember, like go back
Speaker 1: to that story. If he's within your shot, he can
Speaker 1: probably pinpoint your exact location where you're calling from, and
Speaker 1: that is the key, because when you set up in
Speaker 1: that spot, you just have to be patient and hope
Speaker 1: that that bowl hears you and he's gonna come in
Speaker 1: when he feels like it's the opportune time. Maybe he
Speaker 1: needs some time to wallow, maybe he needs some time
Speaker 1: to think about it, maybe he's just gonna take his
Speaker 1: time to investigate. But if you're in the right location,
Speaker 1: it's really hard for a bull that's by himself to
Speaker 1: pass that up. There's so many times where I've been
Speaker 1: hunting on my own or guiding and the weeks just
Speaker 1: seem un action packed. But by doing these tactics and
Speaker 1: these simple little scenarios, I'm able to find success and
Speaker 1: call in a ton of elk a lot more than
Speaker 1: you'd think. When you're talking to other people and they go, man,
Speaker 1: that was a slow week, the ruts not picked off,
Speaker 1: I think to myself, Yeah, but I got something in
Speaker 1: my bag of tricks that's gonna work, And whether the
Speaker 1: elk wanna play or not, I know that by setting
Speaker 1: up that scenario and calling to the elk that's gonna
Speaker 1: come in silent, I can still be successful. One last
Speaker 1: little tip to add to this realistic setup which worked
Speaker 1: really well for me when I was guiding in New Mexico,
Speaker 1: and I would really concentrate this type of approach in
Speaker 1: good feeding areas is I would essentially set up this
Speaker 1: illusion of cows by calling near feeding areas. Now, these
Speaker 1: feeding areas would be bigger meadows. The trouble with that
Speaker 1: is elk. A lot of times the bulls would circle
Speaker 1: and stay and cover and look in there. So what
Speaker 1: I started doing was I started setting up like foldable
Speaker 1: Montana decoys one or two off kind of where I
Speaker 1: was slightly in the timber, so they couldn't catch the
Speaker 1: whole animal at once, but it gave them a visual
Speaker 1: queue to come my direction. That actually really brought in
Speaker 1: a lot more elk that would cruise and kind of
Speaker 1: think something was hinky, But that caused a lot more
Speaker 1: animals to commit to coming within bow range. I would
Speaker 1: say the large majority of the elk that I've tricked
Speaker 1: that way, I've had the decoy out because it gives
Speaker 1: them a focal point. Also, if you're calling, it lets
Speaker 1: them focus on what they see and not you as
Speaker 1: the shooter slash caller drawing back trying to get a shot.
Speaker 1: This is also a really good tactic if you're hunting
Speaker 1: by yourself. Bubling dooble is my hands down favorite way
Speaker 1: to hunt out because it's so action packed, but it's
Speaker 1: also quite difficult to do if you're alone. So this
Speaker 1: is a great tactic for mornings and evenings if you
Speaker 1: are hunting alone, because it helps draw animals to you,
Speaker 1: but also doesn't give your position away if you're using
Speaker 1: it in combination with, say in elk decoy. Honestly, I've
Speaker 1: just cut my teeth on elk hunting and elk calling
Speaker 1: because that's been my main job since high school. Essentially
Speaker 1: is an elk guide. Now, of course I guide for
Speaker 1: everything else, dear sheep, what have you, but the main
Speaker 1: thing is elk. Because of so much time spent calling
Speaker 1: elk and just really obsessing with the interactions of elk.
Speaker 1: I could probably do a daily podcast on tips and
Speaker 1: tactics for just out calling for the rest of the year. However,
Speaker 1: we don't have time for that now. Seeing that it's
Speaker 1: the beginning of September, and I'm hoping that you can
Speaker 1: take some of this into the field with you. Now,
Speaker 1: you might run into some scenarios while you're out there
Speaker 1: that pertained to an instance that you have, like a
Speaker 1: real life encounter in the next week or two weeks
Speaker 1: or three weeks, you know, like what should I have done?
Speaker 1: Or you might use this tip and have a success
Speaker 1: I want to hear about that. I want the questions
Speaker 1: and I want the success stories. Okay, because I tell
Speaker 1: you the things that I really enjoy about it. But
Speaker 1: I'm sure that whatever you run into I've run into it,
Speaker 1: and other people probably have too. So if you have
Speaker 1: a scenario that didn't work out for you, I would
Speaker 1: love to hear from you about it. Also, if you
Speaker 1: have a scenario that worked out for you, would definitely
Speaker 1: love to hear about that. Please send me some photos.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of ways to contact me. You can
Speaker 1: get me a Remy at the meat eater dot com
Speaker 1: is my email for the podcast questions there, and you
Speaker 1: know what we'll do in the future is maybe grab
Speaker 1: compile some of those questions and just machine gun fire
Speaker 1: answering the scenarios that you've encountered, and then, as always,
Speaker 1: feel free to share with me on social media. I
Speaker 1: love that. I love seeing people's successes. I love hearing
Speaker 1: about things that you try, things that worked things that
Speaker 1: didn't work because I want to know that this stuff's
Speaker 1: helping someone, so I appreciate it as always. Thank you
Speaker 1: very much for listening. Let's just keep this elk thing rolling.
Speaker 1: I want to talk a little bit more about it.
Speaker 1: I don't want to burn it out, but i just
Speaker 1: have so much to say and I'm so passionate about
Speaker 1: calling elk. Now is the time to talk about it,
Speaker 1: and then we'll jump into some you know, advanced glassing
Speaker 1: stuff and some other cool stuff here in the future.
Speaker 1: But right now, if you're out there elk hunting, let
Speaker 1: me know how it goes, all right, Catch you later.