Super-Sized String Jumpers: Where to Aim on an Elk

Approaching the crest of the ridge, I looked up to see a cow elk coming from the opposite direction. Our eyes locked, and we both froze. As the stare-down commenced, white tines materialized a few yards behind the cow, appearing to grow from the ground as the bull fed its way over the ridgeline.

The tines grew and grew and grew until the colossal bull was finally in full view. I quickly realized this was, by far, the largest bull I’d ever encountered with bow in hand.

With the cow at 30 yards and staring right at me, I prayed my bow-mounted elk decoy would prevent her from spooking. The relief was overwhelming when she eventually lowered her head and continued feeding in my direction. If she continued her course, she was going to lead the giant bull past me at less than 20 yards, and with a slow right-to-left crosswind, I literally had this bull all but quartered and in the back of my truck. That’s when things began to unravel.

Out of the corner of my eye, a spike bull crested the ridge about 40 yards to my left and was headed right toward my wind! In hindsight, I probably should have cow called to try and stop his progress, but I remained frozen, simply hoping a shot on the big bull would present itself before the spike smelled me. I had no such luck.

The spike suddenly exploded from my left, causing both the big bull and his cow to whirl and circle in startled confusion. The cow, already suspicious from the stare-down moments before, stopped and stared right at me again. Following her lead, the bull fixed his gaze on me as I ranged him at 45 yards. Drawing from behind the bow-mounted decoy, the bull tolerated the movement, but tensed enough to let me know I didn’t have much time. With the panic button in my mind fully mashed, I quickly found my 40- and 50-yard pins, gapped the center of the bull’s vitals between them and released.

When I watched my Lumenok sail just over the bull’s back, I was initially distraught, then furious with myself. The shot was well within my effective range, and I couldn’t understand how I completely whiffed on an animal of that size.

We were filming this hunt for Bowhunter TV, so not only will we all be able to relive the misery of this moment, but we can also rewind the shot to see exactly what happened. Upon a frame-by-frame review back at camp, I was shocked to see this gigantic bull jump the string and duck my arrow as skillfully as a Southern whitetail.

Jumping the string is a phenomenon most whitetail hunters are all too familiar with. It happens when the target animal hears the sound of the bowstring being released and reacts by bending its legs and allowing its body to drop an instant before springing away from the danger. When the timing of this movement affects your arrow’s point of impact, it’s referred to as jumping the string, even though it would be more accurate to call it ducking the string.

BOWHUNTER Contributor Bill Winke has done extensive research on whitetails jumping the string and encourages bowhunters to go into their whitetail hunts with a strategy on how to contend with the phenomenon. After experimenting with different approaches throughout his career, Winke’s recommendation is to aim low in the vitals at heart-level on all whitetail shots. This gives you the best odds of still hitting the vitals if a deer drops, while also ensuring a lethal shot even if it doesn’t move.

While whitetails are the species most known for jumping the string, and most experienced whitetail bowhunters have conditioned themselves to aim with their propensity to do so in mind, many of us who bowhunt larger-bodied species such as elk don’t give the possibility as much consideration. Yet, just about any big-game animal is capable of moving fast enough to change the arrow’s point of impact.

For example, BOWHUNTER Editor-At-Large Curt Wells and I have both been the victims of elk jumping the string on multiple occasions. It can often be difficult to ascertain exactly how much an animal’s movement affected arrow impact with the naked eye, but both of us had the benefit of our shots being on video so they could be thoroughly scrutinized. The shots ranged in distance from 28-45 yards, but they all had one major factor in common; each elk was facing us, on alert, with ears cupped in our direction.

Because we don’t tend to think of elk as string jumpers, many of us aren’t as focused on aiming low as we would be while bowhunting whitetails. Therefore, when things don’t go according to plan and our target animal becomes alerted to our presence and that little voice inside our head starts screaming to hurry and shoot before they get away, I think many of us naturally focus our aim on the center of their oversized vitals instead of holding low. I know it’s exactly what I’ve done each time an elk has jumped the string on me.

After almost four decades of bowhunting, I’m finally beginning to realize I’m never going to develop the ability to calm myself and think clearly as a shot opportunity starts to fall apart. I keep thinking I should simply be able to read the animal’s body language and adjust my aim as necessary, but I don’t seem blessed with the ability to process all that information in the moment of truth. The sad fact is, when my panic button gets pushed, the blood in my veins is anything but icy. I suppose a few lucky bowhunters are blessed with the ability to think clearly through these adrenaline-charged moments, but for the vast majority of us, it’s best to start conditioning ourselves to treat these super-sized string jumpers like whitetails and start aiming at them as if we expect them to move every time.

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