Thursday, December 10, 2009

Close Encounters






Do you remember that I went up to Elk County, PA to see and hear the elk during the rut? Do you remember that I met up with Bradley over at Brad Myers Photo Blog? Do you remember that we mentioned getting close to the elk? Really close? Well, here it is. It was almost the end of the morning (9:20 AM) and it was down to one bull. The herd bull. We had ourselves hidden along an old haul road inside the treeline and we had been there for a while watching everything. Including the big fight. This bull made his way left to right and out about 100, maybe 125, yards. He'd stop and bugle. Move some and bugle again. He then turned towards us and bugled a couple more times. Slowly moving our way. 75 yards. Bugle. 50 yards. Bugle again. All this time I'm clicking away with the camera. Down onto the road. Click. Click. Across the road, still towards us. Click. Click. (my 70-300 zoom is set to 75 mm by now. I can't zoom back anymore) As he approached the edge of the woods he veered to my left. Bradley cowered, Oh, I mean slid in behind me and out of his way. I did have the cover of the tree you see here, it was about 3 inches in diameter. The bull continued to walk on by within 5 yards. He never looked over to us. I think he knew that we knew who the king of the forest really was. It wasn't the guys with the cameras, that's who.

2 comments:

Sparky said...

Great shot. Next time jump him and ride him back to the truck.

Brad Myers said...

What do you mean cowered? I didn't cower I placed you between me and him to protect myself. I think that made me smart. He really did scare the crap out of me. That was a fun morning.

I think we are heading back up this month for some elk in the snow photos.