elk ivory

[dkrakel]

hi,

where exactly are the ivory teeth located in a cow elk and what is the best way to extract and take care of them?

thanks,

dean

[turner1978]

If you open up the mouth and look at the top towards the rear of the mouth you will see 2 teeth. One on each side. Sometimes they are brown sometimes white and sometimes they are really small if it's a young calf. Brown ivorys are usually considered to be prettier than white. I usually insert my knife straight in to the gums on all of the sides of the ivory and loosen as much tissue as possible and then I will pry at the roots alitle bit from one side untill it begins to turn out. Be carefull not to damage the ivory as some of the ivories that I have pulled out have been almost hollow and fragile. Most are not hollow and are pretty strong. Some guys will tell you to use pliers but this is a bad idea since you will scratch the sides of the ivory. Bulls and cows ivorys are in the same spot. After you have pulled the ivory you can use your knife to gently scrape the remaining tissue from the roots untill you have gotten most of it off. I let my ivorys dry out and keep them in my left over barnes bullet boxes but you can put them in any small container that you like. If you make a ring out of them you have to take care of them so that they don't loose ther color. I put mine in crushed cloves at night or whenever I am not whereing it to preserve the color.

The elk ivory is actually an interesting story. At one time elk did not have antlers at all but they had tusks (like wallruss) and they used these tusks to fight over dominance and cows much like they do today. Over time and evolution they developed antlers and the ivories slowly started to receed into there mouths. The only thing that is left is the litle tiny ivory tooth at the back of the mouth. It would be cool to go back in time and hunt elk when they still had both antlers and tusks.

[dkrakel]

hey thank you. very interesting about the evolution from tusks, something i'd not heard of before.

best,

dean

[turner1978]

Did you find your Ivories and were you able to get them out?

[turner1978]

Hey I'm asuming that since you was asking about which bullet to use in your sons rifle for his elk hunt and now your wondering how to extract the teeth your son must have gotten his elk. If I am right witch bullet did you end up using and how did it perform?

Congratulations on your successful hunt!

[dkrakel]

hi,

yes we, got a cow after three days of hard hunting, two of them in a blowing snowstorm. and the third in sub zero cold; lots of walking and very few elk the first two days. the wind whipping around didn't help with the stalking. he did get close on a cow the first morning, crawling for quite a ways through the snow but she was in the open on a hillside and it was tough. just when we got in range and he set up to make the shot we found out we'd crawled into the middle of a bunch of deer and they just blew up spooked in every direction. the elk took the hint of course.

but the storm was moving the herds down and on the third afternoon, after pretty much giving up and being way cold-it was so cold that if you left a can of pop out for very long it turned to slush- as well, we decided to try a place we hadn't been up and all of a sudden we were into hundreds of elk. the hills were just alive with them.

my son passed up one shot because he just couldn't assure himself that he could make a clean shot, very proud of him for that, and the second opportunity he got the elk were close but he was shaking so hard he couldn't hold the crosshairs steady. bad case of elk fever. the next bunch were at a good distance and we decided i'd take the shot. the .338 was reliable as usual and dropped a nice cow with a lung shot. i was using the federal premiums with the .225 grand barnes. the bullet went through her and left us a good blood trail though she only went about fifty feet, just enough to get over the top of the ridge and out of sight.

having a youth license allows my son to participate in any late season cow hunts, so even though he didn't connect in the regular season we'll be heading back over as soon as the old man, me, is recovered from packing that cow out through the snow. humping elk quarters doesn't seem to affect 15 year-olds as much.

i did pull the tusks out, the first time i've done that and so now am trying to figure out how best to preserve them.

dean

[turner1978]

My elk hunt was from oct 15-21 and I lucked out and got a 5 point bull on opening day.

My fiance drew on a late hunt permit for a unit in south east idaho for cow elk and it starts in dec1-14 so we will be crawlin through the snow also. I hope she can get close enoughe to get her first elk. She started huntin with me about 2 years ago and she hasn't had any luck yet. Maybe this will be her lucky year.

Oh and bye the way. There not called tusks any more. Just ivories. People will think your wierd if you keep callin them tusks even though thats what they really are. Good luck on your sons late hunt.

[dkrakel]

thanks on the tusks, ha ha.

good luck on your hunt.

dean