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The following photograph’s and stories are from different hunts and trips where I had invited my neighbors kid, Josh Emmert. Josh has joined up with me for many adventures and has always been a strong contributing hand to have along. His company in camp has and will always be a pleasure.
Josh was 13 when he and I took a 35-day backcountry tour in Montana’s Bob Marshall Wilderness. We started this trip the last week of September packing in from the Spotted Bear River and made camp in various locations along the way. After our third or forth day of riding back into the mountains we found ourselves right in the middle of one of the strongest bugle seasons that I can recall. There seemed to be elk bugling on every snow slide we encountered. We set up a base camp then spiked out on different ridge tops camping out of our saddlebags for two and three nights at a time. The bulls would bugle all night, when they would start quieting down I’d give one blast on my bugle and they would work each other for another half hour at a time. We bugled 13 bulls with in shooting range over the next few days. Josh bagged the 6X6 bull pictured below with a 30 yard shot from a 300 savage rifle less that a quarter mile from our base camp. With in a few days after Josh had taken this bull the rut subsided and it was back to “Lucky if ya get to see one” hunting.
Josh took his first whitetail buck when he was 14. It was taken in the Flathead valley near Kalispell, Montana.
The following summer we went to southwest Alaska to fish for silver salmon on the Togiak River. The trip produced many fish and some great times.
We returned to southwest Alaska in December for a late season moose hunt in the Wood Tikchik Mountains north of Bristol Bay Alaska. We got our moose and did a lot of ice fishing for huge Lakers and some northern pike as well.
Speaking of Northern Pike, I believe Josh was 16 when he brought home this four foot Northern he nailed in Northwest Montana. I tried to talk him into getting a mount done but he insisted on eating it so he could savor the memories of what it tasted like.
Once again Josh and I traveled back to Alaska just a couple seasons ago. This time we concentrated our efforts up above Fairbanks in search of moose and caribou. On this trip we took a pair of kayaks along so we could take advantage of the many rivers that meander through the tundra of the Artic Circle. We spent 65 days hiking up little traveled drainages that fed the rivers we floated. Along the way we saw most every species of big game Alaska has to offer. Josh took this bull caribou along the banks of Birch creek just south of the Arctic Circle.
We has to let a few nice bull moose go due to our capabilities weight and time wise to handle the meat properly. We did get our chance at the right time and the right place and Josh took this bull moose home with him along with his caribou.
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