By Robbie Trujillo

The Hunt for this big bull started at about 10:00 pm on the second day of our hunt. I was guiding Tommy Hussey on a muzzleloader hunt with New Mexico Professional Big Game Hunting Inc.

The bulls had been bugling for us pretty well until the second evening. We didn't see or hear a thing. The elk had left the area we had been hunting, so I decided we needed to find some more bulls.

After hunting until dark, we headed back to camp and ate dinner. By then it was about 9:00 at night. We were tired from hunitng hard all day, but we knew we needed to do something. We jumped in the truck and started driving the roads. About every mile I would stop the truck and listen for bugles.

An hour of doing this hadn't brought us any luck. The rut was winding down, and the bulls just weren't making much noise. I had one more place that I wanted to check out before heading back to camp.

I had high hopes when we pulled up to the last spot. I parked the truck, and as soon as I stuck my head out the window I heard a bugle. That bugle was followed by a few other bugles. I knew where we were gonna be early in the morning. I listened for just a couple of minutes and then we headed back to camp for some rest.

The next morning the bulls were still screaming and we were right in the middle of them. Cows and calves were everywhere, which made it difficult to get close to the bulls. We had one 300 satellite bull come by us, but knew there had to be a bigger one. We followed the elk for a few miles that morning and knew the area where they were bedding down for the day.

The afternoon was really windy which made it tough to hear any bugles. Tommy and I just got on top of a ridge and waited for a couple of hours to see if we could hear anything. It was getting about time for the elk to start moving again, so we got up and headed towards where I thought they were.

We walked a few hundred yards and I thought I heard a bugle through the wind. I couldn't really tell where it came from, so we just kept walking. A few minutes later, I definitely heard a bull. We continued to move towards him and he would bugle about every ten minutes. Then another bull started bugling in the opposite direction. I had to decide which one I thought was bigger and we headed towards him.

We were within 500 yards of the bull now. I didn't do any calling at all because I didn't want to risk spooking the elk. I knew which direction they were moving, so we were trying to cut them off.

We got to the top of the ridge we were on which was fairly open with lots of ponderosa pines. As we slowly walked towards the elk, I spotted a spike feeding about 200 yards away. Tommy was behind me so we got set up where he would have a clear shot if the bull came through.

Just as Tommy got down and had his muzzleloader up, the bull bugled. I could see a couple of cows coming through the trees. I told tommy to be ready. There was only one little opening where we were gonna get a shot if the bull came through. I ranged the elk and told tommy they were 160 yards away. The bull bugled again and then started to come out behind the cows. I saw that he was a bull we wanted to shoot. He was heavy and had long points. Tommy asked me if he was a shooter and I said yes, he was a really big bull.

When the bull got into the small shot window we had, I let out one cow call. The bull stopped, turned and looked toward us. Tommy took his aim and made a perfect shot. The bull didn't go far after the shot, and Tommy had his dream bull.

The bull is an 8x6 that grosses 370 despite having his fourth point on the left side broken almost all the way off. He also has a couple of inches of his main beam broken as well. Without the broken points he would have grossed around 385. Even with the broken points he is a huge bull.

Species: Elk Location of Hunt: New Mexico Weapon: Muzzleloader Equipment: Swarovski Binoculars, Bushnell Rangefinder