I was very excited for my first elk hunt. I was going with my Uncle Wesley and my Godfather Eric. We practiced shooting a lot, but I wasn’t very smart because I didn’t do anything about getting into shape. At one point, when we got to the spot we were going to hunt, I couldn’t breathe. So I learned my lesson about that.
We had been scouting Thursday and Friday. The hunt started on Saturday and by Monday, we were still hunting hard. I had drawn a tag in unit 34 in the Sacramento Mountains of New Mexico and I really wanted to be successful.
We hiked to this logging road and I was totally out of breath, so we sat and waited. The bull started coming down the logging road bugling at the other elk. We got in front of where they were eating and walked up a little hill. There they were – two bulls on either side of the road. I set up my tripod and had to decide which bull to hunt. One bull walked behind a bush, and I was waiting for him to come out. But then, we heard this other one bugle. We turned around slowly and we could see his legs walking. The bull took one last step and came into view at about 70 yards away. I shot and he came right at us. He came within 10 yards and then climbed the hill a little. Since he was so close to the road, he was extremely easy to load.
Afterwards, I couldn’t stop shaking. We took pictures and everyone was really proud of me. In our family, hunting is part of us. It saves us a lot of trips to the grocery store for meat and our hunting trips are really fun.Dillon Lopez
Age 12
Carlsbad, New Mexico