No Glory for the Timid

Bowhunting Bugling Elk is an Unrivaled Experience

by Andy Mill

For 68 years now, my life has been defined by experiences that make my heart jump out of my chest. I have had more than 20 surgeries as a result of great ideas gone bad. Maybe I should’ve stayed in the sandbox rather than climbing over the monkey bars. But the truth is that I wouldn’t have had it any other way.

Once while hiking down into the Black Canyon of the Gunnison in search of trout, I was skirting along a narrow edge when my backpack bumped against the rock wall behind me, kicking me forward and launching me over a vertical drop headfirst. I was certain I was going to die. And yet my life didn’t race before my eyes. I saw no images of my family in my mind. Midway through my fall, I just laughed. If this was God’s way of removing me from the earth it seemed comically inconsequential and random. After a full front flip I lay on a bed of rock with blood covering my face. My hip hit hard, but the blow to my face was only a glancing one. Once I realized I was still alive and going to be okay, all I could think about were the big rainbow trout below me. 

I used to ski for a living. In fact, I have skied the biggest mountains in the world at 80 miles per hour, fished the vast oceans, and battled 800-pound marlin. I’ve been on Italian race bikes and driven high-performance cars pushing 190 miles per hour. Still, calling in a screaming bull elk tops the list of exciting things I’ve ever done! I might be known as a tarpon angler, but given the choice between a 150-pound tarpon on a fly or a big bull crashing toward me, I’ll take the elk every time.

I didn’t earn my first elk with the miles of hiking, constant second-guessing of decisions, and mounting frustration that such hunting normally involves. Hunting over a wallow on a private ranch, all of sudden there was a bull in front of me. Nevertheless, from the moment I was introduced to bowhunting for elk, I knew it would be a life-changing experience. Looking back I can say it altered my life as much as the first time I watched a tarpon eat my fly. The experience was the beginning of 17 years of learning—about elk and the nuances of how to communicate with them—that have made me tougher than I ever thought I could be. 

Elk-hunting also accelerated my son into manhood. A few years ago I was in Springfield, Missouri, emceeing the International Game Fish Association Hall of Fame induction ceremony when my phone rang. 

“I almost got one tonight,” my son roared with excitement. He had called in a bull and a handful of cows and said he was at full draw when one of the cows picked him off and the herd busted. 

“Don’t go back tomorrow,” I said calmly. “Let me get on a plane and we’ll do it together!” When I landed in Aspen early Sunday afternoon, Nicky was there waiting. We raced up to the house to get everything ready. It would soon be evening.

Hunting public land around Aspen is nothing short of brutal. The mountain walls rise straight out of the valley floor, and although elk numbers are good, you have to work to find them. The area we were hunting is as beautiful as it is rugged with a variety of pine and aspen flowing over rolling ridges that drop toward the Roaring Fork River. It’s a good place to catch elk moving from their bedding areas to water and feed. There are never more than a handful of elk, but it only takes one. We were specifically looking for the same bull Nicky had called in a couple of days before and hiked for an hour to where we thought the bull would be.

I love evening hunts. The dimming light always gets my heart pounding a little harder, knowing what might happen in the last few hours of daylight. Unlike morning, when it seems as though time is running out, in the evening, things get better by the minute.

We slid sideways to the east and started our slow move up the mountain, using our ears as much as our eyes. When we neared the spot where Nicky had encountered his bull, I threw out a small locater bugle. Nothing. Still, everything just felt right. As we continued up the drainage, we followed a well-used game trail with fresh sign everywhere. If I’d been a bird dog, my hair would have been standing on end. My hearing has diminished with age, so I kept looking at Nicky, waiting for him to point toward some cracking branch up the mountain.

We climbed higher and 20 minutes later, I let out a soft cow call. Instantly a bull answered above us. I told Nicky to get out ahead of me as I pulled a decoy out of my pack and set it up. A few minutes later we gave each other a thumbs-up, and I let out another soft cow call. A cow immediately appeared over a rise in the mountain and came running across the hill toward me. At 30 yards she stopped, gazed in confusion at the decoy, and slid off into the woods. I called again, and the bull exploded with a guttural scream, this time much closer. 

I saw him silhouetted on a ridge slightly above us, frozen against the skyline. I could tell he knew exactly where the sound had come from but was canting his head back and forth trying to locate the elk that had made it. I knew Nicky wanted me to try and pull him closer with another call, but I stood my ground in silence. I continued watching him, waiting to see what his next move would be. And then he started toward us.

If he continued on the same line, Nicky would have a perfect broadside shot. As he came crashing closer, I saw Nicky draw his bow. I shifted my focus back to the bull and heard the arrow hit with a solid thump. The elk bolted down the side of the mountain a hundred yards before stopping, blood pouring out of his side. Soon his front legs collapsed and he fell forward. I turned to Nicky and we punched at the sky in a celebration only hunters can understand. We waited a bit before scrambling toward the bull, hugging each other in disbelief that the giant six-by-six lying in front of us was the same six-by-six Nicky had had at full draw on Friday night. 

I have certainly lived my life to the fullest, for there is no glory for the timid. But in a life filled with extraordinary moments, calling in that elk with my son is the most memorable by far.