Today is the opener of Idaho’s general deer rifle season. As I write this, I’m sitting in my living room, the sun just peaking up over the eastern horizon with the 8th jacked up pickup truck this morning rolling by. And so the annual road hunt has commenced…

Two weeks ago I got home from my own hunt, albeit a totally different kind. Traditional bowhunting elk on public lands is a low odds proposition. But with a little knowledge, a good helping of stubbornness, and a lot of persistence even a dude with a homemade stick can find success. This year was tougher than usual though. Warm weather, hunting pressure, wolves, little rutting activity. Any one of these things can put a damper on the hunt but when you stack them all on top of one another it makes for a long grind. Nineteen days. Up at 4 am and to bed by 10. Day after day after day. But as they say, you can’t kill an elk while snug in your down bag.

We had some very close calls early on which led me to do something I never do, let an elk walk by. We’ve all been there and we’ve all come to regret it later. But this time at least, it worked out. Check out Part 1 in this year’s elk series. I think you’ll dig it. And if you’re interested in signing up for a selfbow building class click the link. Also, I’ll be giving classes in both Idaho and Florida in 2019 so stay tuned for more info on that. If you want to help support these videos and get some pretty great benefits, click here.

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