I went up on a youth elk hunt this past weekend and had a spectacle unfold in front of me and was conflicted on calling it in to Game and Fish.
Just for the sake of conversation here’s the story.
A friends son had the JR Elk tag. We go up to an area that we scouted a few weeks ago. At first light bulls are bugleing and anticipation grows. Finally we spot a single cow about 75 yds below the ridge were on. His son gets in position to shoot and the cow feeds just out of our sight but in full view of a road in the flats. So all we need is for the cow to feed out about a 100 yds. As we’re waiting here comes a side by side headed to their spot. They have no idea we’re there. Perfect timing for them ,unfortunate for us. The cow spooks runs out in front of them. Time to just watch the show.
The hunter gets out of the side by starts shooting. Miss, Miss now the elk crosses the road and Miss and on the next shot hits her in the back leg. As she start limping across the prairie I decide to video the rest of the incident because I knew what was going to happen.
The cow gets out of their sight so the hunter jumps back in the side by side and they drive quickly down the road about a quarter mile until they start angling away from where the cow went at which time the driver turns off the road and drives cross country about a hundred yards until they can see the cow. The hunter shoots again. Not saying he was still in the side by side when he shot. He could have got out on the passenger side.
They drove cross country again down the opposite side of the fence to get to the cow for recovery which I believe is legal. However after field dressing the side by side leaves. And the parent returns in a truck driving cross country from a different direction.
I did not call it in. Had it not been a JR hunt my attitude would have been different.
I showed the video to a Game Warden I know and he said I should have called it in. JR would have only got a warning. And more then likely the parent would have received 2 tickets. 1 for hunting from a vehicle and 1 for diving off road. The Warden said it was the dream call. Hunters still on site and video of incident.
