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50 °F 5 Day Forecast Friday, December 5, 2003 Today's News | Classifieds | Autos | Homes | Jobs | Tempo | eSouthernOregon | Home Delivery SECTIONS Home Page Local News Sports Business Obituaries Life Opinion - Politics AP News Weather Classified Archives Site Map EXTRA Newspaper in Education Personals Movie Times TV Times E The People CLASSIFIEDS Find a Car Find a Home Find a Job Find a Rental Place an ad eSouthernOregon Automotive Communities Entertainment Publications Recreation Calendar CUSTOMER SERVICE Frequent Questions Advertising Information Home Delivery Employment Contact Us Media Kit Network Affiliate Email Story to a Friend November 6, 2003 Area teen perfects call of the wild Outdoors By MARK FREEMAN Mail Tribune Mike and Scott Marshall are tip-toeing through the dry woods when they stumble upon a small herd of Roosevelt elk, which explode from the brush in fright. As the elk bolted from view faster than a hiccup, Mike Marshall belches a high-pitched bugle at the herd’s lead bull as it flees with his harem of cows. The bull stops, then bugled back to Marshall’s challenge. The fight was on. But this battle between an 800-pound herd bull and two scraggly teenagers Oct. 19 near Willow Lake ends with the teens on top in testimony to how one boy’s unusual gift for elk gab can instantly season even the greenest of hunters. Advertisement Mike Marshall’s bugling lures in the large 6-point bull to within 10 yards of 14-year-old Scott, who kills it with the first shot fired on his first-ever elk hunt. In most hunting stories, it’s the shot that draws the most attention. But in this case, it’s 17-year-old Mike Marshall’s ability to imitate the whiny, whistling words that these largest of Oregon’s big-game animals use to reign dominant in the woods. "I know if my brother wasn’t there and his calls weren’t so good, that elk would have kept going and never stopped," Scott Marshall says. Moreover, Mike Marshall relies on just his lungs and the plastic tube — no diaphragms or other sound-creating devices — to become the Dr. Doolittle of elk even before he’s old enough to vote. "I fooled him pretty good," Mike Marshall says. And there is a lot to fool. The big bull’s thick antlers measure more than 50 inches tall and 35 inches wide, scoring an unofficial 336 points in the Boone & Crockett Club antler-measuring system. It also measures slightly taller than a big six-point elk Mike Marshall killed in 1999 with his first-ever shot in his first elk hunt when he was 13 years old. After the required waiting period, Scott’s antlers likely will be judged in the top 15 killed by Roosevelt bull hunters in the Cascades, says Jim Daniken, a Medford taxidermist who measured the antlers. When it’s entered in Oregon’s official big-game hunting record books, perhaps the bull deserves an asterisk to note that it was completely out-smarted by two kids whose woodsmanship belies their ages. "I told their dad that I don’t know what’s going on with those boys, but I’d stay close to them," Daniken says. The boys have been close to hunting since their infancy. They accompanied their father, Dave Marshall, on elk hunts well before they were old enough to tote a gun themselves. But at age 8, Mike Marshall was old enough to talk to the animals. For years, biologists and hunters have known that elk are some of the most talkative animals in the woods, regularly chatting to each other in a series of chirps, bleats whistles and bugles. One of the most intriguing and demanding of the calls is the bugle. Bulls let loose high-pitched bugles to challenge herd bulls to a fight or warn other bulls to stay away from their harem of cows. Most hunters place a diaphragm in their mouths and blow through tubes to generate the high pitch. Mike Marshall is one of a small sliver of elk-talkers who rely on their own voices bursting through a tube to generate the bugle. "It’s somewhat rare but people do it," says Steve Wagner, spokesman for the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation in Missoula, Mont. "The youngsters seem to be the ones who can hit those high notes." Mike Marshall could hit those notes in third grade. He regularly ventured into the woods with his father to talk back to the elk and by age 13 he had the language down. "When the elk get wary, Mike has a real knack for knowing just how to scream at them," Dave Marshall says. As the wary Marshall trio march into the deep woods Oct. 19 near Willow Lake, their objective is singular — get young Scott his first bull. Their target is a bull Mike Marshall had a short chat with the evening before, so they head into position to challenge this bull to a fight. Dave Marshall heads off one direction while the boys, neither of whom weighs more than 130 pounds, venture down a trail expecting to place Scott in position so the others — both of whom are bowhunters without rifle tags — can work their magic. But the boys accidentally stumble upon the bedded-down elk, spooking the herd. "They were busting branches as they went," Mike Marshall says. "It sounded like a tank going through the woods." The cows have seen and smelled the boys — in the woods, it’s always the women that give you away — but the bull just takes the danger cue from the cows and follows them. Mike Marshall instantly bugles. The bull stops, now figuring it was another bull that sent the cows to flight. "He bugled back and started coming back," he says. Now, most hunters would try to sneak close in hopes of spying the elk in an opening. But the Marshalls start stomping brush and breaking tree branches. "You got to sound like a big bull, and they make a lot of noise going through the woods," Mike Marshall says. As the real bull scrapes his antlers on a tree, Mike Marshall grabs two sticks off the forest floor and rattles them. The bull, convinced he’s about to fight for his harem, steps out of the brush expecting to meet another 800-pound bull. All he sees are two boys. "(Mike) was telling me to shoot him," Scott Marshall says. "I was really nervous, excited, happy. I just couldn’t picture this all happening with a bull that big." Scott Marshall obeys his brother, and the elk quickly falls. "My brother completely fooled that elk for me," Scott Marshall says. "It was great." Reach reporter Mark Freeman at 776-4470, or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home Local News | Sports | Business | Obituaries | Life Opinion - Politics | AP News | Archives | Site Map E Southern Oregon | Classified Copyright © 1997-2003 Mail Tribune. All rights reserved. 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