00:00:00 Speaker 1: What's up, y'all. I'm Casey and I'm Tyler and this is another big Buck breakdown from the Element podcast, brought to you by Exodus Trail Cameras. All right, guys, on the show today, we have got Tony Ball. He is a Colorado resident who is a straight, stone cold killer. Tony. What's happening, man, Don't not much, just getting organized here from the end of ELK season, trying to figure my life out, plan a wedding, and and kill some more stuff. I'm gonna start the season of seasons, sir. It's gonna be the best of all. Yeah, and don't kill your marriage though, you know, marriage is just starting. So uh well, the wife has uh has an ELK tag, so you know what, maybe we'll just kicking off of the bank her first and uh yeah, we'll just smooth sail right into uh, you know, fifty years of happiness and as much as I want, Yeah, I love it, dude. Is that actually the honeymoon trip is you know that ELK tag she has, or you'll got something planned in between there. No, we were supposed to go to New Zealand on a honeymoon and then with this Corona stuff, that's got pushed out, so she's she's kind of left it up in the air whatever we kind of want to do. She's a huge fly fisherman, and we've gotten here in the hunt in the past couple of years, so she's all about Alaska. That's cool. I'm kind of looking at maybe doing something like that. But we elope in July, and what's that. It's gonna be getting cold up there soon, isn't it in Alaska? Oh yeah, yeah, this is gonna have to be next year. Ye safe. I'm from Texas, so that's like the first thing we think about. Snow. What's that you guys? You guys head back south once uh, once elk season is done up here in the Rockies, you get out of this cold stuff. Snowbirds. Man. Man, let me tell you, we hit some of that snow that was kind of residual from that set week blizzard that happened. It was like we camped in an ice box, man. I mean it's like the sun never hit where where our tents were, and it was just freezing cold. But uh, surprisingly enough, usually come back to Texas and it's still sweltering, and it wasn't this year. It was it's been pretty mild. It's been a good September for us, but been a stellar september for you. Man, you absolutely smoked a stud the Colorado. Dude, that's a great bull. Bull. That's right, that's right, that's right. So this is normally a big buck breakdown. But we know that there we we kind of know the back store on this and we had to get you on to to kind of talk about this thing. Man, So tell us about that hunt for that bull. Yeah, I appreciate it. No, I Uh, I was just a lucky one that was able to release an arrow. I was hunting with a couple of longtime hunting buddies, brothers uh Naton, Dan McCorkle um, you know, stone cold killers from from up here that kind of took me under their wing. I don't know, many years ago, and and uh we were hunting, hunting as a trail. We had three elk tags and uh kind of got into some bulls. We were we were in the back country quite a few miles six or seven miles, got into some gun in some elk the evening of day one and day two, and then man, we were grinding day three and four and weren't really seeing a bunch, weren't really getting into him, and decided to go back to where we were hunting. Day two. It was kind of this long aspen drainage that that kind of went up above timberline and turned into Beatle kill and and had this really awesome bench with a ton of wallows and then just you know, the elk had been living in there for all summer. Seemed like a ton of sign and and uh yeah, sun started coming up, started hearing, you know, a couple of bugles on the ridge, and before we knew it, the bull piped off, I don't know, n hundred yards away and and my buddy Nate dropped back and Dan and I were out front. Kind of called the Triangle of Death fun when he got three guys and he got a bull that wants to play because someone's gonna get a shot or someone's gonna you know, someone's gonna miss, so we're gonna we're gonna kill something. So um, Nate was back there and men were huge, huge proponents at Chris row and and what he teaches, and a couple of lost cow calls and a bull bugle eighty yarts from me in a bull bugle eighty arts from dan and it was kind of like a race to see who could shoot, who could shoot the bull first. Uh Nate was back there, just you know, giving giving all the uh assembly muse and calf calls they could, and within like forty five seconds, I just hear an arrow, you know, get let go and a bunch of crashing and Dannage shot shot his bullet like ten yards. So he shoots that bowl and in my bull, the one that was coming in, you know, towards me. He he swung down wind and busted. So we were we were hooping in holler and trying to stay quiet, and kind of seemed like as the as the morning kept progressing, this heard that we had kind of to our west, and then the herd that was back to the south, they almost met right in this right in this bottom where the aspens transitioned to tow uh dark timber, and it was all of a sudden, you know, there was six seven, eight bowls googling a couple of herd bowls. I mean everyone was just trying to trying to grab that hot cow. I think this was September, we think about this nineteenth, so you know, it's been pretty slow up until then. And yeah, there must have been a hot cower too, because there was there was some unbelievable googling. Um, we started shadowing the herd. You know, we were going to sit there and cut up Dan's ball, and we're like, what are we doing? Like we could kill another one? This is nuts. So with our packs um Nate and I did, and Dan were like, well you're all time caller, dude, you're tagged out and slipped up in there and we're shadowing the one herd that was kind of us as to us and and uh, at this point, day five, man, it's it was pretty much browning down. I mean I had I had wanted to kill a six point, but I also want to fill the fraser and with a couple more days a hunt, and it was it was on. So we we got in there and kind of had a little bit of a bugle fest with a with a bowl. Um that ended up you know being my bull that come in and he just come in super timid and slow. And and what really changed him is once we once we went from super excited cow calls or Dan did, to two kind of more relaxed um sweet sexy cow calls and you know, some bugles and some braking. He really, I mean it kind of changed. He was more defensive and then he was kind of more more more passive and just kind of come in real nice and slow. He's actually feeding kind of on his way in. And and uh, I had a couple of openings and he turned up hill to get on the same level as Dan, on the same elevation. And when he did, I come to full draw and the stupid thing stopped behind a bunch of timber. So of course, I mean, you guys know how it is. You're sitting there, you start shaking. You know, you're you're doubting if he's gonna step through. Do you let down? Do you not? And uh, he took another step and a half and I guessed him or right about thirty two, maybe you know, thirty two, and he was like twenty five. So I let that arrow go and hit him low I think, you know, probably bottom of the heart. And he spun and and ran downhill. And as he was running away, I was like, oh, yeah, he does have six points. It looks good to me. And just like Tony was talking about, man, sometimes when you're on a big bull in the mountains, you have to draw back and hold your draw for a long time before you get your shot. And whenever you're doing that, you need a comfortable release that you are comfortable with, that you are confident in, and you know it's going to perform to the best of your ability and never fail you. And that's exactly what Cobra releases are. I love mine. I've got a little hook style release where I don't even have to look at him my big loop. I just hook that thing through drawback and I'm locked in and ready to go to shoot a big bull or a big buck. So go check out Cobra archery dot com. He ran down there and it was a super open kind of creek bed well, there was still a bunch of elk, you know, above him, and he was you know, kind of went down there and and bedded pretty close to the creek. So I had all that noise to cover, you know, if I was going to sneak in and try to get another arrow in him or what. And uh, you know, kind of like my dad and grandpa would say, you know, keep shooting until there's four legs in the air. So I snuck down there and he was kind of going in and out um with a heart shot. He was, he was hurting pretty good and able to get another one in him. And it was weird, you know. I shot him again right behind the shoulder, and he sat there for like three Mississippi like nothing had even happened. Um, and then get up, you know, got up and did the death run. Well, he ran out of sight and not a kind of like, uh, what just happened? Like he just he just acted like he wouldn't wounded. And I could see my arrow was hanging out on the opposite side shoulder and then it fell out halfway through. So when he went out of site kind of up the creek, we were like, well, let's give him some time. And so we're just sitting there and kind of counting the minutes, and I don't know, twenty minutes had gone by, and another bull bugled and this bull he come out of those aspen and I think he was just kind of following the herd, just you know, rag horn bull just kind of wanting some love. So we we set up real quick and made a couple of cow calls and Nate was, you know, he was only one left head and shot, well, he shoots a long bow. He was he was pretty bloodthirsty. So this bull come you know, he comes in pretty good, but just kind of skirted Nate and he come into five yards for me where I was calcalling. I knew my thermals were gonna get him at some point. Well, the bull was like in between me and Nate at one point, and I could see him sneaking through the timber right Like. The bull didn't swing down wind like a like a lot of elk do to catch, you know, to catch saying, he just comes straight in. So all of a sudden, I'm I'm laying there like I am in the firing line if he lets an arrow go, like, I don't know if I spook the elk out of here and ruined this opportunity, or duck for cover or cover my vitals because I might have a you know, a two fifty grain cutthroat coming my way any second. So luckily the bull ended up. I say luckily the bull ended up spooking. I don't think Nate was too happy about it, but we all kind of joined back. I was like, wow, you know that's pretty cool, and uh, we all sat down. You're like, let's calm our nerves and see what happens. And I stood up on my knees to get something out of my pack, and Nate's bull, you know, nice little four by five bowl, was raking a tree in the sunlight, and I was like, there's another one right there. So I slipped behind Nate and and made some soft cow calls, and he stroked that bowl like thirty three yards, and I don't think he ran forty yards, I mean double lunged him. I've never seen a bull die so fast. He was shooting, shooting that long bow, and I think they're two fifty green cutthroat broadheads from Ruckmount Specially. Geartt there in Denver and just pummeled that thing. And he died. He died so fast, and just to watch him go down in sight was just insane. So we were all we were all in shock there at that point, you know, just hugs and high fives and what did you just do? And you know you're on lows, the lows to the highest highest and uh. We walked up to his bowl and admiring it, and I looked over my shoulder and my bowl was laying sixty fifty sixty yards away up on that hill, just dead. So that's that's like the old days where you hear about guys just you know, mountain and stacking them up. That's like what y'all did with three bulls. That's nuts. Yeah, we looked at we looked it. Uh. We took a picture at Dan's bulls main there. We took a picture him like seven fifteen, And when we were standing over Nate's bull, it was eight thirty and we knew, you know, for us to have three bulls shot, you know, died pretty much inside, we were all just like, this is never gonna happen again. Nate was like, it didn't matter how many bulls were bugling, I had to shoot that bull. For us to kill all three bulls, you know, in an hour, it's just never gonna like. I just got to take advantage of the opportunity. And we were super blessed that day that it was us, absolutely and quite honestly, that's never gonna happen to anybody much less y'all. You know, that is crazy. They what a story to tell to you know, your kids and your grandkids and everything for forever. Man, it's just a freaking awesome thing. But I gotta ask the pack out on three from the back country, how I go, that's a good question. Um, Well we're we're, you know, in in in no shape or or or means the hardcore you know, you know fitness dudes. We just trying to stay in shape. But there was no way we were going to get one, let alone three bulls out of the back country. So we had we had some good friends and an outfitter lined up with horses. Yeah, so we and there was no way we could hunt that country without it. Man, I mean, it doesn't matter, it doesn't matter how we we being near killed ourselves. We cut meat for like five hours, hung it in trees, getting it cooled, and we had a super nice overcast day that day, which was kind of unlike the rest of the latter half of September has been in Colorado has just been hot. It's been clear. Um. But we had a great day that day, got meat hung, and then we packed. Nate and Ey's bull was like point seven miles from a meadow we thought the horses could get to and we kind of gambled on it. But we were like, I think we can cut trail through kind of the aspen as it goes down back, you know, to a main trail, and we packed down our two bulls to there. And then Dan he's he's a crazy CrossFit dude. He packed his old bull out by himself. But it was three yards away from that meadow, so he got it done. He got it done pretty quick. Um yeah, So we had all three bulls there right about dark, so we you know, we were done right around that eight mark or whatever. And then um, we started walking back to camp at night at at eight thirty, right as it was getting dark. That's a long but rewarding day, that's for sure. I've shared some whiskey and some and uh, I don't think we ate ribis. No, we ate rebis the next night because the outfitter was able to bring us up some good food. But um, yeah, we were. We were ready for some sleep, for sure. Would imagine, man, I would for sure. It's Uh, I've never had the privilege of killing elk in the morning. I've killed two bulls and they've both been at last lot, So you're cutting up ntil like eleven pm, which is kind of eerie and kind of cool the same time. I'm not really that bear scared, So it's not that big of a deal for me. But yeah, then both, Yeah, grizzlies are a different story. But that's why we hunt in Colorado. So uh but it's neat to cut up a bowl and just be sitting there cutting up elk, having a good time and then you just hear bugles popping off. You know. It's like a it's kind of a surreal feeling. So it is pretty awesome. Man. Yeah, So is this is this like when something like this happens, do you guys look at it like, Man, this could happen in any unit that we hunt um or is this something where you're like, Okay, there's something that we need to come back here for. Man, it was it's tough not to say we need to you know, we need to draw this tag every single year, you know, or we need to pay a h an amount of money that our wives will slap us for for a land under about it like that, because it was incredible, but you know, I mean we explored a lot of country and you know, obviously didn't have that sort of encounter. It was just a mix of kind of the factors. I mean, the moon was good, you know, the equinox was right there, two different herds coming together, the hot cow and just that magical, that magical morning that you that you dream about, you know, for September, and it just it happened to happen to happen to us. I think I think you could definitely do it, you know in other units, especially in Colorado. Um, just with the amount of elk we have. You know, none of these none of these bulls were giants, you know, three fifty three sixty, you know, three thirty bulls. But just the amount of you know, bulled cal ratio I think is huge factor in all of those stars you know lined up for us. Uh, we were able to capitalize. And and what was I think the coolest part of the whole scenario was, you know, Nate was calling for Dan's bull, Dan was calling for my bowl, and I was calling for nate School. Yeah, and it was all like, you know what, I killed the best bull. But it wasn't because I did anything special. It's because my caller did his job and he walked in front of me, you know, and any single you know, any one of us you know, would have been able to to to shoot you know, the bull that I killed and and and vice versa on any of the other bulls. I mean, we had had some opportunities, you know on day two on you know, fifty bowl, and it just doesn't happen. Know, it just didn't work out. So it was it was a very uh, just a very awesome experience just to just to be able to be there with you know, some of the awesome, awesome dudes have been able to to hunt with and get to know and and and then enjoy the experience just as much as you do. For man. So um, you know, you said, y'all actually came back to that place after going, you know, kind of looking for elsewhere. What changed to make it so good? Had y'all overlooked ilk or had they moved in because of hunter pressure or something? They're like, why did that spot suddenly get good? Yeah, we knew there were some hunters on a on a distant ridge, UM that had filled the outfitter had said, uh, and we and we're going in there. We we we pretty much blew it up on day two. I mean, we hunted the dark timber hard. We like we went to you know, we like to call it born and raised it. You know, we went through the dark timber and trolled and bugled, and you know, we did anything we could to wake a bull up and piss them off. Um, but just the scent that we left in there taking a nap, you know, hanging out. We just felt like we should give it a couple of days. And we all this other country looked great too, And I mean we we spent day four, the day before all this craziness happened. We didn't see an elk here. We saw a bighorn sheep, we saw a deer, we saw moose, but we didn't see an elk. And I mean we were like, man, people made a mistake, like maybe we need to get extracted a sap. This is you know, this isn't gonna happen. And then a drop of a hat, like you guys know, when you're at least expecting it, you walk into something like that where same elk had been pushed in the cow. You know, there's a cow and heat and here we go. Yeah, yeah, I like the nineteenth man that I killed them bulls, and uh, you know how it is. It's if you kill something today, that means you like that day and nobody's ever like I killed well that day, but it's not my favorite. You know, it's not really exactly exactly. I've been the last Friday of the season guy forever. Really, yeah, they just make me earn it every single year and just you know, have have big bulls just piss me off and break my heart all season long, and then when it's browning down, the last Friday of the season just seems to do it for me. So I was like, well, I'm not gonna kill a bull. We're not on the last Friday of the season. This year, you made it happen either way. You didn't even need that Friday luck. That's good, I know, dude. That's such an awesome story, man, it's really really cool. Uh and your season is really not over right, it's just kind of beginning then. It's just kind of beginning. Yeah, we uh yes, So we live in in northeastern Colorado and and uh, like I was telling you guys earlier, um my grandpa homesteaded here in the early nineteen hundreds and it's been passed down to the family fourth generation. Now my cousin, uh Cody Ball manages and and runs the ranch now with his mom and uh my grandma still lives out there. But we have like what we call, you know, super fun awesome antelope camp coming up this weekend. Get a bunch of a bunch of good friends and family around with rifle antelope tags and see how many prairie carp we can stack up opening morning. That's there's a couple of us that try to shoot good ones. But you know, if anything, it's a it's a fun time to to get together. And then yeah, my wife's got a first season um rifle oak tag here in Colorado. And then that's the next two weekends and we get married October sixteenth, which is a Friday, and maybe do a little fishing that weekend if she'll she'll go with me. Nice. Yeah, yeah, I've never fished that much in the fall because we're always we're always uh hunting. So there's a there's a ton of good fishing. We're gonna get married in Laramie, Wyoming, So yeah, we have that. And then it's deer season. Man, it's time to get after some mule deer and I guess a few of those white tails if if you're into that sort of thing, you know, we kind of like those pretty good. This week we're gonna be equal opportunity abusers. Um, either one is gonna go down. For us, we're heading South Dakota and it's just a deer take, so whatever we can stick, especially since we didn't have a lot of luck in Elk season. Um, like our our minimums are dropping. You know, it's kind of Uh, I don't live this way, but from what I hear, like, if you're a single person and you're out on the town as the night gets later, yeah, you don't get your beers. That's right. So I'm in the waiting hours of the night right now. If he's got a forty at the bottom of the camera, that's right. As we mentioned, we're heading up to South Dakota right now, and for us, a lot of times on these out of state trips, if they're extended, say like five six, seven days, like this should be. What we'll do is we'll hang a trail camera early on in the trip and hopefully be able to come back and reference the data that we get off of that. And the truck cameras we've been using the last couple of years, uh, last several years actually have been the Exodus trail cameras. They perform awesome, guys. They have one of the best warranties out there, maybe the best warranty out there, and because of that, we have confidence to put those trail cameras on public land where they do stand a pretty high chance to get stolen, but with their warranty, that's no big deal. So if you hunt public land or you just want some high quality imagery out of your trail cameras, go check out Exodus outdoor gear dot com. Is there is there any factor of you guys aren't bringing home elk meat? So the lines are like, well, then why do you why do you go? Honey? Absolutely, It's like my wife's favorite thing to eat is elk. She loves it, and uh, I've been feeding a wild hog and she's actually kind of turning on that. She kind of likes it. But you know, you can't beat elk, and uh, she likes it well done, so she won't be able to tell the difference in that and mule deer probably no, Yeah, I just get everyone was speaking. Man. We we funded a lot of you know, playing build here in in corn fed mule deer and whitetail, and I don't think you can tell a difference yeah, I've kind of wanted that. I would imagine, you know, well, I've eaten a few mule deer from up in the high country stuff. You know, we're not really high, but you know that's living dark timber and stuff, and and they kind of tend to have a little taste to him, it seems. But uh, out of bed, it's just like a corn fed cow, you know, like they're gonna taste pretty good. So hopefully so. Man, Well, if people want to keep up with, uh, you know, what you've got going on and and all the stuff that you keep you know, slopping and laying down. Man, where can they check out what you got going on? Uh? Yeah, I'm on I'm on Ptagram. Uh, Tony g Ball just all one word, Um, golf ball has your name golf not golf. No, that was that was a good, uh good high school joke. I'm sure you guys can pretty the other from words to uh to uh to form a nickname. Might yeah, might, yeah, spit ball. My name my daughter Crystal. Yeah. Well I just became a dad recently, so I have to throw out some dad jokes. It's just the way it goes. Yeah. Well cool, if you're listening to good Fallow Tony. He he has a pretty cool page. You can see that giant bull that he uh he shot this year with his buddies. And you actually posted a pretty cool picture of the day where you could see I think it was Dan's bull in the backgrounds that ride or somebody's in the background and and it's h he did a panorama Nate did when I was sitting there, you know, admire and my bowl, and you can you can look close and and see his bull laying down there in the creek. It was us. Mean, we didn't drag it into focus. You can't. You can't drag it out anyway. I thought Dan was a cross fitter. They can do anything, can't they. That's true. You might have put on the shoulders if I asked him. Well, if he didn't post it on Instagram, he's not a true cross fitter. Right. We gotta make sure everybody knows what they're doing. You know, we're gonna you guys need some hate mail for that. Everybody knows we're kidding guys too. So we have a lot of guys who like, you know, duplex cookies and stuff, right, Reess, that was the big thing today is lots of ress. So uh, anyways, Tony, thanks so much for coming on and telling us a story. Dude. Good luck the rest of the season. You got a lot of a lot of tags to feel and I hope you get them all. And uh, you'all have fun and larry me on on the uh the wedding and the fishing trip. Man. Yeah, I appreciate it. Guys. Thanks again, and uh, I really enjoyed uh what you guys got going on. So we'll be talking soon, I'm sure. And good luck to Tap Dakota. Man, what an awesome story about a big buck. Guys, we want to say big thanks to Exodus, Trail Camers and Cobra Archery for being a part of this big buck breakdown for sure, man. And also if you want to check out what we do on a daily basis, maybe even see some of these big bucks, go to Instagram and follow us at the Element Wild and then also subscribe on YouTube keep up with what we're doing throughout the season and subscribe on the podcast. And remember this is your element living in across and meet you. I'm not sure why we even have to fucking grew up being in the same situation between it's causing a lot of frustration. Brothers, let's forgiving for games.

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