Elk NetworkGeological Student Finds Record Elk

General | August 7, 2018

How’s this for a great day at school? Illinois State University geological student Preston Konop found a 368 6/8″ Boone and Crockett bull while completing his field work towards his degree. His account, as first told by the Herald Times, is below:

“As my partner and I were hiking down a mountain, we stopped to look at the map. While my partner was finding our location on the map, I was looking for a sample to identify which rock unit we were in when I saw what appeared to be a rib cage. I went to investigate it and found the elk’s skull still attached to the rib cage. It was mostly picked clean by scavengers, and the rib cage, spine and skull were all that was left.

“After breaking the skull away from the rest of the body, my professor who was nearby and partner helped me carry it down the mountain, about a mile, to the road where we could load it into one of the trucks we had with. The skull weighed at least 35 pounds, and when walking down slope through brush it was pretty challenging.

“After getting it back to camp, the warden came out to tag the bull. He said it was about seven or eight years old and told me how he thought it died. Once the elk got back to Wisconsin from the taxidermist, I had it scored by a Boone and Crockett scorer, the gross score is 368 6/8 inches.”