I am pleased to report to each of you that our first ever UWC Disabled Elk Hunt was a success!
Last night (September 21st), Perry, Jerry, and myself met with Randy Kirby in Tabiona, UT to take Mike on a great elk hunt.
We met with our hunter a little after 4:00 PM and drove him out to a secluded valley where the land owner (Wayne) has an alfalfa field that the elk like to come in and feed on in the evening. Randy positioned the hunter in his vehicle about 200 yards from the most common entrance point. He then placed Stillhunterman and myself in a small blind roughly between the two locations and Randy then positioned himself on the other side of the valley to act as spotter.
Due to Mike's disability, he had to shoot from his vehicle with the aid of his brother and good friend Josh (who nominated him). The vehicle faced broad side to where the elk came in, allowing our hunter a great range of motion to get his rifle into position.
Jerry sat in the vehicle with Mike and his family (including 4 boys that were between 5 and 10 years old), and acted as the voice of Randy to confirm which bull could be harvested. And aside from a full Suburban with 8 people, Jerry said it was a fun expierience with some very excited boys.
At about 6:40 we had our first sight of some cows with calfs that hopped over the fence to eat, and they hung around for roughly 30 minutes until they were spooked by something and left. We were all disappointed thinking that we might not have any luck this evening but decided to wait a little longer.
Just before shooting hours ended, a group of around 20 or so (est) came into view and Randy said over the radio that there was a spike and small rag horn bringing up the rear and to be ready. Once they all cleared the fence into the alphalpha field, Randy gave the go-ahead to take the small bull.
I may have been excited, or time went by very fast. But in what felt like less than a minute from the green light, the elk gave a broad-side view to our hunter at a range of about 150 yards (est) and Mike took a single shot straight through the lungs and downed his bull.
We waited a few minutes before checking the bull and then went down to finally get a good look at his animal. The boys were so excited that they ran the whole way down instead of riding with their father!
After taking some pictures, Randy drug the bull up into the cedars to dress the animal and the boys were so excited that they even wanted to lend a hand! After giving them all some laytex gloves, they dug in and poked around the guts and felt the heart and had a great time.
Once we had the animal taken care of, we loaded it up in the back of my truck and brought it back to town and put it on Mike's utility trailer for the ride home.
In all, this was a great experience that I hope Mike's sons will remember for the rest of their lives and I am proud to know that the UWC had a small hand in helping create a memory for a family that hasn't had the opportunity to hunt like they would hope to due to Mike's muscular dystrophy.
But most importantly, thank you Randy Kirby and Wayne for making this a possibility. The UWC is very thankful for your generosity and time. Without people like you, I sincerely dont know where we would be. This was a true privilege and honor to be able to share your time and hospitality and to see a well deserving hunter like Mike get out with his boys. The look on his face and boys' faces was worth a million words and really left me with a great feeling. In some ways, I feel like I was one of the biggest benefactors of this hunt because of how good it felt to be a part of this. Thank you from the bottom of my heart!
This is what hunting is all about gentlemen! Sharing quality time with our kids!
Mike Marx, with his brother and friend (Josh) holding up his elk
These kids were sure proud of their dad's elk!
Happy boys!
The hunting party
The first group coming looking out of the blind
The UWC crew out front (Jerry, Bax, and Perry)
