Out of Staters.

             Unfortunately, the story I’m about to tell cost me my favorite hunting spot and some friendship, but I guess this is how you find out who your real friends are. This story is about the rifle opening weekend in Montana on Kelsey’s family ranch, back where I shot my first 2 bucks. As I start getting my plans for opening weekend, I reached out to my friend Kelsey whose family ranch I had hunted many times in the past.  She gave me permission to hunt there the day after the opener and whenever else I wanted to go the rest of the season. So, I made my plans, I would take my gym partner Cody and roommate Mike along with me. Even though they didn’t have tags they wanted to tag along and help with the hunt. Cody is from Texas and has hunted and guided for years, Mike was from Washington and just wanted an excuse to get out. I had a handful of other friends reach out trying to hunt the ranch with me, but I told them that 3 was enough people for that day and we can go another day. Well, that put a bad taste in their mouth to begin with, but I wasn’t looking for a group of 10 on this parcel of land for the first day of the season and I didn’t feel that that was right inviting that many people in the first place.

            So, opening day was here the three of us drove out to Livingston before sunrise to get to the ranch in time. We ended up being a bit late because I couldn’t remember what the dirt road looked like in the dark. This ranch was a large cattle ranch and there was one section of it off in the back corner that we were allowed to hunt. I sat in the passenger seat of Cody’s F150 so that automatically put me on gate duty. Well after about 5 cattle gates we made it. We ended up driving the truck all the way up this very steep hill just about to our glassing point. We all hop out of the truck I lock and load my 30-06 that my dad passed down to me and head for the glassing knob. In the past I use to just hike around and look for game but since Cody had guided in the past, I figured we would take his lead this time. well, we sat there about 15 minutes, and I was ready to get moving. Cody said, “Tyler holds up just be patient I promise I’ll put you on something”. Well, wasn’t five minutes after that that we see a loan bull elk running over coolies right towards us.

            This bull was coming right to us and fast from what must have been a mile. In the past two years of me hunting there I had only seen elk there once before that and they were way too far out of range for us to get on them. It seemed like this area was just an area they passed through. Well luck was on my side that day because this bull came running straight into our laps. This was wide open country nothing for us to really hide behind. I was scooting to get into position waiting for Cody to tell me to take the shot, Cody had me rest the run on his shoulder as a shooting rest. While I was moving around the bull must have seen us. He put the brakes on quick and turned right around, he was at about 450 yards at that time. “Shoot him” he was running off and quick BOOM he kept running like nothing happened BOOM… WHACK, BOOM WHACK. Well, I got into him on those last 2 shots he was really showing down but up over the hill and out of sight.

            I didn’t know if he went down or not but we were about to go and find out. Well, I wasn’t much of a runner at the time but that day I sure was. Cody and I rand to that hill as fast as we could while Mike stayed on the glassing knob making sure he didn’t see the bull run off or show up anywhere else. Well mike didn’t see my bull go anywhere but he did tell me he saw a decent size group of even bigger bulls running on the opposite hill. As Cody and I came to the crest of the hill he told me to stop take a minute to catch my breath and calm my heartrate and be ready to start shooting. After a very quick rest we slowly crested the hill and there he was still standing but really struggling. I put 2 more shots in him from only around 60 yards away. He ended up falling over and expiring right on the property line fence.

            Cody and I walked over, and I got to put hands on him, he was a heavy 5x6 bull. I wasn’t a trophy hunter even though he did have a pretty good size rack I was more so mesmerized by the pure size of elk up close and personal. I set the goal of shooting an elk while out at school but after my first 2 years and all my friends that were locals never shooting elk before I just thought it was a fat chance of ever happening. That’s why I truly feel like luck was on my side that day, I was really in the right place at the right time. Well, I got the truck and Mike met us up at the elk and we all celebrated took photos and got to gutting.  Most people that I have heard stories from have to heavy pack their elk out. The 3 of us just dragged him into the truck bed can’t get any better than that another example of luck being on my side that day. Once he was in the truck, I called all my friends and family. I even texted Kelsey telling her I got a bull and thanked her so much for allowing me to hunt her family ranch. The three of us went back to Bozeman and I took everyone out to lunch to celebrate.

            We went to the main strip in Bozeman parked the car right in front of the restaurant and got washed up in the restroom. We all sat down for a meal going over the hunt together. Mike was telling me as my bull was coming in, he was bugling like crazy I must have been so hopped up on adrenalin that I had no idea what was going on.  Once we all got back to my house, we skinned the head so I could get it to my taxidermist at the time and put the body in the garage to rest for the night so we could start butchering in the morning. Well, here is where the rest of the drama unraveled.  The Montana boys didn’t like that I got a bull before they did, and that I didn’t bring them along for the hunt. They used to hunt the ranch as well but didn’t keep up with the friendship, so they no longer had the connection anymore. So, they called the landowner and told them that I shot the bull on the neighbor’s property. Right when I found this out, I texted Kelsey and sent her a photo of exactly where the bull went down. She told me not to worry at all she knows exactly where that was on the property and that I didn’t poach the bull. Unfortunately, she did tell me later that season that her family had decided to only allow family to hunt the property from now on. As you can see that ended some friendships for me with the Montana boys even though while I stayed in Montana, I did continue to stay friends with Kelsey.

            Well moral of the story is sometimes one’s persons success brings out others true colors and you learn who your real friends are. The out of state crew got it done on the first day all hunting together. After butchering the bull up in the driveway right on Durston Road for all of Bozeman to see we had more meat than we knew what to do with. We made steaks, sausage, and ground. I had the stand-up freezer just about completely full witch is a gold mine for a college kid on a budget. I shared that meat between the 3 of us, Mike and I lived at the same house and Cody was over all the time and he knew just to take whatever he wanted whenever he wanted it. Even though I left Montana and moved back to Pennsylvania I keep in touch with Cody and Mike all the time. Even go and visit them when I get the chance, they turned into being my true friends.