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Hunters use variety of techniques to track down big game
By Ken Marsh / Anchorage Daily News correspondent
Big-game hunting in Alaska is a science involving planning, strategy and refined backcountry skills. Ultimately, however, the heart of the hunt, the part that defines its success or failure, is a hunter's ability to find and get within range of the game.
Three hunting options most popular in Alaska are spot-and-stalk, still hunting and calling. Each has its own advantages under the right conditions, depending upon the game you seek.
• Spot-and-stalk hunting is particularly effective in mountainous country or sparsely treed taiga and tundra areas where game can be seen from long distances. The concept is simple. Hunters station themselves in spots overlooking areas where the game is most likely to be found. For Dall sheep hunters, this may mean watching feeding areas such as high saddles and grassy alpine meadows flanked by rocky outcroppings that provide animals avenues of safety if pursued. Moose hunters might tend to watch the bases of mountains or hills where brush and sparse forest provide the animals' preferred food and cover.
Once a hunter finds a good overlook, he makes himself comfortable and breaks out his spotting tools -- optics. Both binoculars and spotting scopes may be used. Binoculars can be especially effective for quickly finding game at long distances. Effective spotters think of the area they're working in terms of a grid, carefully and deliberately examining a specific part before moving their binoculars to the next.
• To get started still hunting, a hunter finds an area that indicates strong numbers of animals. Look for antler rubs on small trees, bedding areas indicated by flattened grass and recently used game trails. When a good area is found, hunters walk slowly and quietly, stopping frequently to look and listen for game.
Binoculars carried on a neck strap can be helpful for carefully checking the edges of meadows, lakes or muskegs hunters may encounter. Hunters who are familiar with the species they're stalking and who know where to look are frequently rewarded by still hunting.
• Calling can be an effective way to hunt moose and deer in the fall when these animals are in the rut, or fall breeding season. Basically, the point of calling is to bring the animals to you. To do this, hunters try to imitate the sounds made by rutting animals.
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