Well, unfortunately, no animal harvested (yet). First trip was a bust.
We tried several different areas too. Hiked between 6 and 10 miles a day, over all sorts of different terrain. :grumpy:
Our group saw 2-3 animals a day, but they were seen mostly in the middle of the day, too far off to shoot, and appeared to be moving rapidly through the area. Seems that the warm weather has most of the animals still way up high in their summer range, likely still at or above timberline (~11,000 ft). We saw temperatures above 70 degrees almost daily at elevations above 10,000 ft, which is pretty unusual for this time of the year.
Still haven't had a freeze up there either, and the animals we did see weren't vocalizing at all. Anything we heard (poorly) calling was other hunters. :thumbdn:
We talked with about 15 other small groups of hunters over the course of the week, several from Eastern coast states (NY, NC, KY), and we heard the same story everywhere. Few fresh signs, very few animals seen (sounds like we had the best luck there), and even locals who've been hunting this area for 25-30 years can't recall a season with such poor luck. I feel bad for all the people that traveled 1,000 miles or more for a 2-week trip and went home empty-handed.
That's hunting though.
The good news is that I have heard of some other parts of the state where it hasn't been quite so tough this year, and with almost 2 weeks still left in the season, there's still some hope. My brother can't hunt again until the last couple days of the season, so looks like I'll be doing solo day trips a bit closer to home if I want to try and get an animal between now and then. That's a tough way to do it, but it's about the only option I have left for archery season.
I wasn't planning to rifle hunt for Elk this year, but with the way archery season is shaping up, rifle season might be pretty good this year. I need to see if I can get a list B or C Elk license for one of the rifle seasons.
ETA: Of the choices presented in this thread, I wound up carrying the Muk, HACKtive duty, and Scrapmax 460. I wanted to have some SR-101 in the mix too, and decided to grab one of my Rat Wardens to take at the last minute. Very little extra weight for that one, and it's done its fair share of game processing (mostly small game and fish) for me in the past.