A good day in the snow

I took the day off from work this past Thursday and took Bruce back to where I had been finding elk antlers. We got up at 2 am to drive to this area so we would be able to start hiking at sunrise. The snow, however, was a little bit of a surprize.



The first antler, a fresh 6 point


Soon, Bruce spotted his first antler, a fresh 5 point


Bruce hiking.


Another fresh 5 point


Bruce finding the match.


A year old 4 point.


Another year old 4 point


Two fresh antlers, but not a match


A few yards away I spotted this.


A nice fresh 6 point.


Can you find the antler?


A fresh 6 point, however, the fifth point was broken some time ago.


Later on in the day it started to snow pretty good, so we called it a day and ended up with 10 antlers.



On the hike back, we spotted some elk through the fog up on a hill. Here's a few pictures of them. In the binoculars we could see a few of them were bulls and had already had at least 2 feet of antlers growing!

My best solo trip ever

Some of the awesome scenery


A nice year old 6 point, however, the rodents had their share first.


A better shot of the same antler and the surrounding scenery.


Can you see the antler?


A little closer


This gives a better perspective of the size of this awesome fresh 6-point


The match was nearby in the trees.


The set together.



A year old 6 point


The match in the trees, however, the rodents found it too.


An older deer antler


Another fresh 6 point


A little closer



One for the mountain to keep


A fresh 5 point


A fresh 7-point



The match nearby



A couple of pictures of the set together



By now, this is what my pile of antlers looked like. It's always a good problem to have when you're not sure how you're going to carry them all out.


On my way out I found another fresh 5 point.


A closer shot


And an older 6 point with a broken brow tine.


An elk up on the mountain


I now knew I could not carry my antlers all the way back so I built a make-shift travois.


A long walk out


Finally, five hours later, I made it back to the Jeep.