Well instead of fishing this weekend, I went out and filled my damage controll AHE cow tag. It was in the Green mountain unit. I got her at 8 am, and got her packed out and to the truck before the deluge of rain came down!! Sorry no pictures at the moment. My buddy had some technical difficulties with the digital camera. Ooops? I will try to post a picutre if I can later. At least we wil be eating good for a while now!
Buck

Good job. I've been trying to keep an ear peeled for AHE opportunity on the East side but haven't heard anything good in a while. Would like to go over with my son (also AHE) before it's too late.

Again, congrats!

Congrats nice Job

Fisherdan - I'm accompanying some AHE buddies to the Yakima firing range tomorrow for the cow elk hunt. I'll let you know how it goes.

Well, we hunted the Yakima training center on Saturday for the AHE elk hunt, but no success. Saw some deer, but no elk. Spent most of the day driving and stopping at vantage points to spot, as none of us had been on the YTC before. Saw a bit of fresh sign, but not that much. Frankly, still not certain where the elk are - i.e. with the warm weather, did they migrate back up to the trees above Ellensburg or back across the Yakima River? Are they down below in the farms? Or are they still tucked in the sage hills somewhere on the YTC? A somewhat frustrating day - we just need to spend more time over there to figure it out.

BTW, if anyone wants to show the kids some animals, we drove back home through the Yakima canyon - probably saw 75 bighorns and another 50 deer. I try to drive through the canyon whenever I can to look at the animals - this was about as good as I've seen it. They obviously winter in there (note, didn't see any damn elk though!).

I drew an "invite only" AHE tag. Well I finally got invited, and am going tomorrow. We'll see how it works out!

Nice!!! Meat in the freezer, beats that heck outta that store bought crap.

They might still be there in YTC. I've seen elk in the sage draws bed down like deer when you think you can't see em & they are there. Maybe they aren't by the road but I bet there's some in the draws that are a little hike.

Yeah, I don't doubt that they are still there. The fresh sign we saw had to come from somewhere! Without knowing more about the area, we spent more time exploring a large area rather than focusing on smaller, hikeable areas. Gives me an excuse to go back - any reason to be in the field in February is a good reason....

Call the number on your Outdoor Recreation Orientation card to see if it is open before you go. I tried to go last weekend after checking the website to see what training areas were open. I showed up at 5:30am only to be told it had been totally closed the better part of the week due to a helicopter crash.

Uggh, that's brutal! Similar thing almost happened to us the weekend before...didn't realize that the MP's checked your license, registration and proof of insurance before allowing you on the YTC. Went out to the truck (I had our only vehicle) and couldn't find my current insurance card - thought my buddies were gonna kill me! Turned out okay though as the MP didn't say anything about the expired insurance card, but I was definitely sweating it for awhile. That's a long/early trip from Seattle (or Bothell) to get turned away.

It is a real pain to hunt there if you don't have your stuff together. Our first trip we took my parent's truck and my mom swore the registration was there, which it wasn't. We ended up skipping the day after Thanksgiving and going the next day after we could order new registration. So far this year I have had bad luck with the YTC. You look at some of the big bulls listed at the check in counter?

WSU, what were you hunting for. i went up there 2 weekends ago with some ahe buddies and didn't see any elk. went up to untanum ridge and made it up the 3 or 4 hill before the slick mud forced us to turn around. endend up getting a cow on the 4th as we were pulling up to the hunting spot.

I was hunting for elk. Did you get the elk off the YTC or down around the valley somewhere. We found elk down in the valley last weekend but it was either on private property or just out of the area.