The elk was in such a rugged area, that recovery by horse was kinda the only option, and that wasn’t happening in the cold dark where an injured horse or human is a real possibility. The elk would have to wait for morning.
With the temperature already in the thirties and dropping fast with a forecast low in the low twenties, so long as we got the hot internal organs out and opened up the cavity for cold air to get in, the meat was in no danger of spoiling.
Once we accomplished that, we stuffed the heart and liver in my backpack and began the long and precarious hike down the steep mountain through the rocky ravine in the pitch dark guided by our headlamps.
It was a long trip.
We finally made it home and had some tasty fresh smoked elk liver and cold beer to celebrate.
Then it was showers and much needed sleep.
The next morning it was time to link up with Scotty and help him get his horses ready for the elk recovery -a simple task that would prove to be anything but simple and end up being an adventure in itself.
For days, Scotty’s horses had been hanging around his house doing pretty much nothing but eat and relax.
Apparently they got wind of having to work in the cold morning and they all found an open gate and took off. 😄😄🙄
Well, you can’t saddle horses that aren’t there, so the first thing to do was find them.
The good news was that the gate they went out led to another fenced area.
The bad news is that fenced area was like a hundred acres. 😄😄
So we knew where they were, but not where they were. 😄
Scotty grabbed a truck, horse trailer and some bridles, and set off to where he figured they went.
Sure enough, they were right where he thought they’d be, but the instant they saw the bridle, they said nope! and took off. 😄
So a new plan was hatched and we ran down to a corner gate, opened it, and used the Mud Taxi to make it so the horses would get channeled out the gate and onto the main dirt road where Scotty assured us they would head home on their own once they did that.
Ok, if you say so, lol.
So that’s what we did-hazed the little herd of horses into the corner and out the gate, and sure enough, they took off on a trot in the direction of their home.
We got in the Mud Taxi and followed them to make sure they didn’t stray, while Scotty went and got his truck and trailer and headed to his house by a different route.
Of course, when we got the horses almost home, they decided to cut and run a different direction to go check out the neighbors herd of miniature donkeys, so I had to jump out and herd them away from all that ass on foot while Denise used the Mud Taxi to cut off their retreat.
About that time, Scotty reappeared with his truck and trailer and together we got all the troublesome equines home and into their corrals without further issue.
And so, hours late, Scotty saddled up a couple of now sweaty horses and loaded them into the trailer , and we finally made the drive to the tree cut area to start the horseback elk recovery.
Now, I say “we”, but the truth is I barely know one end of the horse from the other, and certainly don’t know how to ride one-although I’ve always wanted to. Denise used to ride horses a lot as a kid, but that was long ago and far away. This was no easy flat trail ride, and no place to learn to ride, so it was all up to Scotty.
All we could do was watch, and marvel at how the horses easily covered the distance that took us an hour and a half in about 20 minutes.
See that buff colored ridge in the background? That’s where the elk is-it’s quite a distance.
Our friend Scotty is not only the local rancher, he owns and operates a legit hunting ranch fully stocked with exotics -https://www.duntonranch.net/
He’s also a licensed hunting guide and pretty much spends his life hunting.
And as such, he made short work of quartering up Denise’s elk and getting it loaded on to the horses. In not much time at all, he was on his way back down the mountain with our meat for the year.
I’m almost qualified to hold a horse in place if it’s tired and doesn’t want to move anyway. 😄😄
After that, all we had to do was unload everything, clean and hang the meat, and roll it into the walk-in for a couple of days before it heads off to a local meat processor. Yum-yum!!
And THAT finally concludes our little hunting story that took place several weeks ago.
Hopefully some of you enjoyed it-I know it’s pretty different content for RDP.