3 Tips for Western Big Game Hunters

The Subtle Art of Still-Hunting Western Big Game

I was alone and creeping silently through a boggy, hidden stand of aspen and willow deep in the timber, wandering a circuitous path toward a meadow where we’d spotted a small elk herd earlier. Suddenly, something large stood up from its bed behind a wide spruce not 30 yards in front of me. With elk on the mind, I mewed with the Phelps Maverick diaphragm call on the roof of my mouth. The animal stopped. I nocked an arrow. But instead of a bull, a...

Western Hunting: A First Look

Many hunters who live east of the Mississippi River dream of their first western big game hunt, be it calling to bugling elk in the dark timber, stalking pronghorn antelope across the high plains, or glassing rugged desert canyons for mule deer.  But planning such a hunt can be intimidating. At MeatEater, we get tons of questions from hunters looking for information about first-time, do-it-yourself western hunts. We are happy to provide some...

Tips for Decoying and Calling Big Game

Calling and decoying big game is so much fun because it’s just about the only time in life when you can justify deception, double-crossing, hoaxing, fraud, dupery, and dishonesty. Here, the goal of the hunter is to mimic, through visual and audio trickery, the same critters that he’s trying to harvest. It’s an exciting, challenging, and interactive discipline that forces you to learn detailed information about your quarry, information that will...