I'm looking very seriously at doing a DIY Over the Counter elk hunt out west within the next 1-2 years with one of my brothers.

Like most of us, I live on a budget which makes gearing up for an elk hunt a bit of a challenge financially (read: I can't realistically justify spending $500+ on a pack I'll use once a year, at best). With that said, I think I've started to develop a plan, but I'm looking for input. Here goes...

Essentially it's a 3 piece system:
1) Frame hauler
2) "Camp pack"
3) Day pack
Bonus item! Rifle

The hunt would most likely be structured in such a way that we'd hike in, establish a base camp, hunt various locations around the base camp each day. My thinking is, using the "system" outlined above I can take a modular approach that allows me to haul everything I need, and allows me to break up the purchases in to smaller more manageable pieces.

Obviously the frame hauler is the foundation and would be used in every phase of the hunt - Initial camp set up > day hunts > harvest/pack out (God willing) > camp tear down

Camp pack would only be used during the initial hike in. Once at the campsite it'd be removed from the frame and left at the base camp. Camp pack would include the traditional camping supplies - sleep system/tent or hammock/cache of food/etc.

Day pack would remain on the on frame hauler and used for day-to-day stuff - first aid kit/water/food/stove/rain gear/gps/ammo/knives, game bags, processing gear/etc.

Should I be successful, after the shot and recovery I could immediately begin processing, and then haul the first quarter out using the frame hauler. Once all the meat's been hauled out, I'd return to the base camp, pack up the camp back, make one final hike out, then hit the road.

Full disclosure, I'm a flatlander from Iowa. I've got a lot to learn (which is why I'm asking if this is crazy). I know full well that the elevation will make life challenging, and as such I've already started training. My first purchase will be the frame hauler which will allow me to throw some sandbags on there and start rucking hills around here. So, all that said, your constructive feedback would be much appreciated. Thanks!

I have this and I love it.  This price is a steal (normally under $300)


It's only in mandrake at this price which kind of sucks. All my other camo is highlander.

It's a pretty big pack, but cinches down VERY tight to get rid of the slack. There's two bottom straps that you can un-roll and connect them to two buckles on the top and literally compacts the whole bag. This pack was well thought out.

It Has a rifle holder, two large pockets on the sides ( I use these for my spotting scope and tripod for glassing), You can remove that small pack in the front (has it's own set of straps and a bladder pocket), and best of all, You can take the main bag out, and use the frame as a hauler)

Slumberjack 4500



Here's another pack (I've never used) but, gets a lot of hype. ALPS OutdoorZ Commander Freighter Frame + Pack Bag

The slumberjack weighs 2lbs lighter though

Awesome. Thanks for recommendation, I'll doing some digging on the Slumberjack.

I've been seeing the ALPS pack mentioned several times in various places. I'm considering purchasing just the frame portion of the ALPS pack - ALPS OutdoorZ Commander Freighter Frame

One have any experience with this frame (or the frame/pack combo for that matter)?

In 2016 I put my gear on a diet and cut my equipment weight nearly in half. Best decision I ever made. Light gear is expensive, but so is knee surgery.

Part of that was consolidating to a single pack vs freighter+big-pack+day-pack.

Dump the money on a Exo Mountain Gear pack that does all 3 jobs. I hated spending the money, but it was one of the best gear purchases I've ever made. That and comfortable boots.

I was able to do a 7 day hunt with a 26# total pack weight. It was awesome.

I have the Alps Outdoorz Traverse EPS and while I haven't packed an elk out with it, I have logged a lot of miles with it.  While it's a smaller pack, I know how much I can fit in it and wouldn't want to carry anymore in one trip.

I'd first come to grips with what you're capability is as far as packing out an elk and be REALLY realistic with yourself.  No matter what, an elk is going to require LOTS of trips in and out.  Taking a larger pack just means you can load it down more, not that you can carry more.  I personally would find out what you're willing and capable of carrying and find a pack that meets that rather than getting the largest pack you can possibly find.  With my gear in my pack, I'm sitting at 35 lbs.  Add meat and it's going to be stupid heavy and more than I can or would want to carry.

I too have heard good thing about the commander, but like I said before, you'll load it down with more than you'll likely want to carry for too long.  My two cents.

(I have packed out many deer and elk using other packs, so this is coming from experience)

edit:  one more thing, like the poster above me, invest in good lightweight gear.  I would leave the "knives and processing gear" at home and just get a Havalon with replaceable blades.  That is literally all you will need to debone an elk in the field and pack it back to your truck.  Seriously the best knife I've used.  I processed 2 deer with the piranta and only changed the blade twice.

I really appreciate the input guys. Very good points raised so far.

Expanding upon my original post, my plan (after establishing camp) is to dump most of my gear and hunt each day with a day pack strapped to a frame. I figure this will keep weight to a minimum, yet still have the frame pack available should it be needed for the real fun of hauling out an animal.

I'll add that I've spent time at elevation at various points throughout my life - fair amount of skiing, some camping, and I climbed a 14'er a few years ago. I know enough to know that everything is harder in at elevation. As a result I've started myself on a workout regimen geared towards elk hunting -- lots of cardio (especially stairs), squats/deadlifts/lunges, and fair amount of rowing mixed in. Coming from Iowa I realize I'll be at a disadvantage compared to more local hunters, but I plan to offset this as much as possible by working extremely hard leading up to season. Strong legs, strong lungs is my de facto mantra.

One of my first purchases will likely be a pack of some kind. Once that materializes I plan to load it up with a sandbag and start putting the miles on hiking local trails and hills. We have a seven mile road race in my area at the end of July. My goal is to work up to participating in this race while wearing my pack loaded with a 70lb sandbag. This should be more than my total hunting pack weight. But it should also help condition my legs and lungs for operating at altitude.

Sorry for long post, trying to answer questions before they get asked. As always constructive input is appreciated.

Packing around a 100lbs of head, cape and hind quarter on a $60 mil surplus pack last year pretty hard to beat for the price and its packed a lot of elk out. Im also an Iowa flat lander I load it down with wool blankeds sleeping bag whatever in the summer to try and stay in shape but there is just no substitute for the altitude it will kick your ass.

I've done 15 diy elk hunts definitely a huge learning curve I said it before but our first year we were green horn as could be about froze/starved to death

I use a Cabela's Alaskan frame with a day pack.

Binoculars harness and a Kifaru Gunbearer means I can travel with my hands free.

I'm very new to this as well, but not to hiking and spending time in the wild. I really like having everything I need with me to process game, or spend the night if required. A little food and an emergency blanket can make all the difference. Sounds to me like you are on the right track. I certainly didn't come up with this idea, many before me have used pack frames to haul a day pack and meat if successful.
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Your in for a world of fun and on the right track, made many self guided elk hunts through the years. I dont know where your headed but you may be making one big mistake that we made in the beginning, hiking in and setting up base camp can work against you in a very big way, It seams like the best idea but it often results in pushing the elk far out of the area your looking to hunt. A base camp you can drive to and small quiet, camp fire-less and all whispers, 2 man max spike camps works better where we hunt in Wyoming. One night in each spike camp and move on, people moving into a area and setting up a camp for hunting season pushes them high or over the next range and you will never see them again. The other problem with a base camp in the bush is sometimes you have to evacuate fast if a major snowstorm moves in, it is not uncommon to get a few feet of snow overnight and have to be rescued with snow machines during rifle season. Getting up at 3 am to a cold camp and packing up to bug out and get on top of he mountain you saw them grazing on top of the day before is really hard but well worth it. Convection is most hunters mistake, when the sun warms the ground the wind blows up the hill, if your at the bottom of the mountain when the sun rises you will have the wind against you every time, you have to be on top before the sun rises. Camping on top of the mountain ruins the area with evening convection blowing down the mountain. We typically spike at 8500 feet and get to 10-10,5 by daybreak. Small spike camp, gorilla warfare style always works best for us. Good luck my friend, your in for a great time with your friends/brother. I killed this elk and the next day my brother took his just a few miles away on the same ridge.

This is getting me pumped. Thanks everyone.

I feel like Colorado is the obvious choice for an OTC tag, but I'm also looking seriously at Idaho. As I understand it you can get tags for elk, mulies, wolves and black bears all on the same hunt/season. I should also note that this is almost certainly going to be a 2018 hunt.

Any thoughts/suggestions/comments?

I'm no expert, I've only been hunting here for a few years, and finally got my first bull last year...

Deer tags in Colorado seem harder to win than the powerball.

Over the counter is Bull only. Most areas have a point restriction.

If you aren't going with a guide or group that knows the lay of the land and where the animals are... It will probably be a scouting trip.

How far do you think you are going to hike in, and set up camp? If it's more than a mile from your vehicle, and you are hunting even further away, I'd recommend de-boning out in the field. You might pull it off with some help, but full quarters are heavy.

I've thought about doing what you are planning to attempt, but it seems unnecessarily difficult and dangerous. As others have said, you can hunt from an RV/Car camp location. The weather changes quick up there. I personally don't know anyone who hunts lightfighter style during rifle season. If I was going to be more than a few miles from my vehicles for any duration during late fall, I'd bring snow shoes. Trudging through two feet or more of snow with a pack...That gets old and dangerous real quick.

Elk are big. Really big. Miles over very rough country sounds miserable.

I have read posts on hunting forums about knowing where elk are, but not being willing to carry them out.

They say 10 percent of the people kill 90 percent of the elk. Maybe they are the ones who are too hard headed to know better.

My wife says we need to hunt deer more before we start on elk. Probably not a bad idea.

I would definitely debone everything even if i was 500y from my truck look up the gutless method thats the only way id do it with a small saw count up 3 ribs saw the spine and down both sides and bam theres your hanging tenders

Thanks guys.

I've read about the gutless method but have never given it more than a passing glance - not really needed with whitetails, here in Iowa we always drag them out whole after field dressing. I'll add the gutless method to my list of things to get proficient with. That list gets longer by the day it seems .

Regarding how we’ll be hunting - parking lot vs. base camp - I’m definitely not sold on any particular approach. Maximizing my odds (while being safe, of course) of filling my tag is top priority. I’d love a massive 350+” bull, but I’m not at all above harvesting a cow. I realize I’ll probably enjoy it no matter what, but I’d prefer to not spend ~2 years preparing for a multi-day nature walk if you know what I mean.

I’ve been spending some time over at the Rokslide forums - lots of great info over there by the way. I don’t have a link to the thread, but one user described their style like this: Get up and leave camp (parking lot) very very early. Drive down the road, stopping every quarter mile or so to send out a locator call. Sit and listen for 3-5 minutes. No response? Move on down the road a quarter mile and repeat. Get a response? Grab the packs and start attempting to locate.

Seems kind of like cheating to me, but at the same time it also seems kind of smart to me. :shrug:

Anyone care to share their style or method of elk hunting?

That method of drive and call sounds more of a bow method but not rifle, the rut is mostly over by rifle season and you may get a response from one but it is not likely. On public land try to figure getting in 5 miles before things are going to happen for you weather you camp in or hike in early in the am. This will separate you from the rest of the pack. Couple of very important points: who you go with is VERY important to your success and your pleasure of the trip. Some guys you really dont know until you travel with them, some guys you dont find out about them until you have a elk on the ground. Some guys will go back and sleep in the truck the first time a bear sniffs your tent while your in it. You really dont know about people until you get there.Your on the right track with a self guided hunt if your that kind of person, my first couple of rifle elk were a fantastic experience, but then you will want to try with a bow, either way you will always have more to be proud of with any elk you get on your own. Unfortunately weather and attitudes can doom your trip before you leave. Odds a very much against you but as a party we have never been skunked, bow or rifle. Some years everyone filled a tag.

I've got a Stone Glacier 5900 on the way.   Should be here Friday.   I'll post some pics of it.

Pretty excited to get it in hand.  One of my buddies is a super serious elk guy and he says it's the best pack he's ever used hands down.  He switched from an Exo 3500, and had a MR before that.

First few years back from the Army I used my old Alice pack.  Packed out a Cow and my brother used it for a Bull.  I haven't drawn an Elk tag here in Nevada and just haven't been able to do any out of state hunts lately.  Since the last Elk hunt I decided come hell or high water I was going to buy an ATV.  I shot my last Cow much further in than I should have and was stuck packing her out.  I was in great shape back then and living at 5000' elevation.  Ran 5 miles every other day and lifted the other days.  While that helped me quite a bit, packing that thing out was about all I could do and when I was done getting her in the coolers I passed out and could barely move the rest of the day.

Since I have the ATV packing out animals has gotten a whole lot easier.

Thanks guys all the input guys. Slight update:

This hunt will definitely not be happening in 2017, but rather 2018. Also, my brothers are out, but I've got two co-workers who I'm close with that have been kicking around similar plans of their own. So it sounds like this may end up being a 3 man OTC hunt.

Until recently I failed to realize that Colorado's OTC rifle elk hunts are for bulls only (I was under the impression that they were any-sex). This obviously limits our opportunities to harvest an animal. So, with that said... we're now considering doing the archery season, which is any-sex and doesn't interfere with Iowa's whitetail rut. We may still end up going rifle season, but basically we're currently not sure.

Up until this point I had been thinking rifle season was a no-brainer because of the range advantage a rifle has over a bow. But when you limit that to bulls only, that obviously changes the equation. The other advantage (as I understand it) to Colorado's archery elk season is that it corresponds with the elk rut theoretically making them a little easier to locate/call/etc.. But again the limiting range of a bow vs. a rifle is a factor that I cannot ignore.

Any strong feelings one way or another? Thanks in advance!

I have a friend who goes to Colorado every year for Elk and deer(when he draws a deer tag).  He goes with a large group of guys who have all pitched in and bought the big walled tent, stoves, the whole set up.  Out of the 8 or so guys who go at least 3 or 4 get an bull each year.  This past year they didn't do so well since they got caught in a big snow storm and were immobile for a few days.  He was thinking this year go for muzzleloader season but I haven't heard if that's still the plan or not.

Does your buddy hunt rifle or archery season?

This sounds pretty close to what I was envisioning. Been reading a lot about packs, frames, etc.. While I'd love to get an EXO or Kifaru that's just not feasible right now. I've been looking at lots of frame options and keep circling back to the Cabela's Alaskan Outfitter Frame -OR- the Cabela's Alaskan Frame. Any thoughts on either of these?

You go gutless?

That's the word.

Hopefully going to try it in October.

I have the Alaskan, my wife has the Outfitter. We like them. I think for $100 you would be hard pressed to do better.

Folding filet in my pack makes short work of it and getting all the quarters boned out

Last year I did something very similar to what you are planning, except I went solo.  I recommend setting up a base camp at your vehicle, near a trailhead where you want to hunt and packing in to a minimal presence spike camp so as not to disturb the elk.

One of the best pieces of advice I can offer is not to do a late season hunt at high elevation if you aren't intimately familiar with the area and weather patterns first.  Get a September hunt under your belt and learn the area before you try braving the really challenging weather.  

The second best piece of advice I can offer is keep up with the stair climber and work in lots of squats and lunges.  I was on the stair climber for 30-60 minutes at a time, almost daily, for a good two months before my hunt and my legs were still on fire for the first few days.  

One more thing to keep in mind.  I assume you won't have horses available to you.  Bear in mind how far from the trailhead you pack in.  It's not to difficult to walk in 10 miles when you are fresh and unencumbered by a dead elk, especially when the trailhead is at the top of the mountain.  But if you kill an elk that far in on foot, you're gonna be fucked.  That's a 20 mile round trip.  Half of it will be loaded down and up hill.  Since I was by myself, I figured it would take me 3-6 round trips to pack out an elk and my gear, depending on the size of the animal.  If I was 10 miles from the trailhead, that would probably take me 2-5 days to get everything out, assuming, exhaustion doesn't kill me first.

Having said that, since you will be on public land with plenty of other hunters nearby, some of them, maybe even most will be hunting with horses.  Don't be afraid to ask to hire out their horses to pack your elk out if you do get one.

I decided on Idaho over Colorado because I wanted to hunt mule deer too and I didn't plan the trip early enough to put in for the mulie draw.  In Idaho, you can buy an OTC general deer tag that is good for mulie and whitetail, and is valid in many parts of the state.  In fact, after my October rifle elk hunt was called on account of weather, I went to southern Idaho where the snow hadn't hit yet to look for a good area to hunt mulies.  

I also have a buddy that has hunted Idaho and another that has hunted Colorado and they persuaded me away from Colorado.  I would still like to hunt Colorado at some point, but I'm going to stick with Idaho for the near future.

The archery tag I had was good for either cow or bull.  The way Idaho does their tags is a little quirky compared to how we do it in AZ, but if you read my thread below you should get the gist of it.

If I can find the time and money to do it again this year, I will be heading back to the same spot for the archery season.

Here is my thread from last year detailing my experiences:  http://www.ar15.com/forums/t_10_2/686810_Help-With-DIY-Non-resident-Idaho-Elk-and-Mule-Deer.html

P.S. - If you are having a hard time finding the elk, check your topo map for the nastiest, shittiest canyon you can find.  Thick brush, blow downs, and swamp bogs are what you want.  That's where the elk will be hiding from all of the hunters.  Most aren't willing to go in there to get them.

Did the OP get a pack?

I just got this, and after a succession of 100-200$ packs that pretty much sucked to carry, I think I have found one that fits me properly.

I have a really long torso at 6'4, so maybe that was the problem.  The problem is now solved.  Kuiu ultra 3000.  Only had it out a few times, but it makes 30 lbs feel like 10.

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