Marlin60Man
Member
Friend of mine and I went up to this local public shooting range yesterday. It's a popular spot for elk hunters too, and it's located in this little valley area along a rural road. Well, there's about 100 yards of field from the pull-off area to the tree line, and then about 100 yards of woods before the hill.
Anyway, yesterday when we went out shooting someone had left some pumpkins out there. One that was at 75 yards was practically untouched and I wanted to try some 100 yard shots with my new .22, so I grabbed it and walked across the field to the tree line and mounted the pumpkin on a branch sticking up off some dead-fall.
As I was walking through the field I noticed a lot of what I figure was elk scat--about three or four fresh piles. They were pellets about 1 1/2" to 2" diameter, and looked pretty fresh so I started to become a little more careful of my surroundings.
Well, we shot quite a bit at the pumpkin, and I told my friend to go out and check to see if we were hitting as I reloaded some. I heard an odd noise... I could only really describe it as kind of a "clicking" or "thudding", kind of a soft click. Honestly I thought it was a squirrel nearby, but then I look up and my friend is frozen in his tracks about 10 yards from the tree line right before a slight trench that separates it from the rest of the field.
He comes back and says, "I swear I heard something growl at me, hard to describe," and I said, "Yeah, I kind of heard something too." It felt kind of silly, but we didn't walk back to the pumpkin without the .22 on us--'cause that'll stop an elk.
Anyway, were we in any real danger from the wildlife? There's been an elk hide out in the field ( along with its legs ) for about a week and a half too. Any chance that could attract predators? There are cougars in the area, but I would think with so much elk they wouldn't bother with human. Plus I don't know if a hide really has enough meat on it to attract any scavengers.
So my thought is that there was an elk in the brush and that maybe it was giving a distress call or something from the noise we were making. Do elk have any kind of warning call like, "Don't come any further or I'll charge?"
Neither my friend and I hunt, but I don't want to get attacked by an elk or something next time we go out there. I'm hoping it was just our imagination that got the best of us, because I've never heard of elk to be the type of animal that would hang around in woods 100 yard from humans target shooting. I would just like to know for sure whether there is any real danger, other than being out in large animals' territory.
Anyway, yesterday when we went out shooting someone had left some pumpkins out there. One that was at 75 yards was practically untouched and I wanted to try some 100 yard shots with my new .22, so I grabbed it and walked across the field to the tree line and mounted the pumpkin on a branch sticking up off some dead-fall.
As I was walking through the field I noticed a lot of what I figure was elk scat--about three or four fresh piles. They were pellets about 1 1/2" to 2" diameter, and looked pretty fresh so I started to become a little more careful of my surroundings.
Well, we shot quite a bit at the pumpkin, and I told my friend to go out and check to see if we were hitting as I reloaded some. I heard an odd noise... I could only really describe it as kind of a "clicking" or "thudding", kind of a soft click. Honestly I thought it was a squirrel nearby, but then I look up and my friend is frozen in his tracks about 10 yards from the tree line right before a slight trench that separates it from the rest of the field.
He comes back and says, "I swear I heard something growl at me, hard to describe," and I said, "Yeah, I kind of heard something too." It felt kind of silly, but we didn't walk back to the pumpkin without the .22 on us--'cause that'll stop an elk.
Anyway, were we in any real danger from the wildlife? There's been an elk hide out in the field ( along with its legs ) for about a week and a half too. Any chance that could attract predators? There are cougars in the area, but I would think with so much elk they wouldn't bother with human. Plus I don't know if a hide really has enough meat on it to attract any scavengers.
So my thought is that there was an elk in the brush and that maybe it was giving a distress call or something from the noise we were making. Do elk have any kind of warning call like, "Don't come any further or I'll charge?"
Neither my friend and I hunt, but I don't want to get attacked by an elk or something next time we go out there. I'm hoping it was just our imagination that got the best of us, because I've never heard of elk to be the type of animal that would hang around in woods 100 yard from humans target shooting. I would just like to know for sure whether there is any real danger, other than being out in large animals' territory.
