ELK ESSENTIALS
From fitness to scouting to calling, everything you need to know to outsmart a wary bugler
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When you know the terrain well, you can devise various plans#3 Know your hunting area
The more you know your hunting grounds, the better your chances of finding elk. Before the season begins, spend time walking through the area and reviewing aerial photos or satellite images from Google Earth. In particular, it’s vital to identify the terrain where elk feed, water, travel and bed. While these areas typically remain the same from year to year, logging or rotational farming can change things up. For example, elk like to feed on canola, but the locations of canola fields typically move each year. That impacts how and where the elk will travel to reach those places.
Getting to really know an area also lets you access hunting spots via a variety of routes. That way, you can use the wind to your advantage (see #4), take a shortcut or simply ensure you don’t get lost, especially if you’re walking in the dark.
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#4 Mind the wind
As with hunting any big game, scent control is paramount. Elk have incredibly sensitive sniffers, however, so even the best attempts to conceal your odour using special soaps, scent-blockers and apparel are often futile. No, your best bet is to work with the wind, always striving to remain downwind of the elk you are hunting.