Glassing Question

[pfraze]

I have a question for you experienced glassers. I usually don't do much glassing because it is thick where I hunt. Since I am not getting any younger, I have decided to change my approach and cover more ground with my binoculars. My question is this, how far are you guys able to distinguish whether or not something is an elk with a pair of 10x42 binoculars? I'm not worried about telling if it is a bull or cow, I just need to be able to tell if it's an elk. I really don't want to pack around a spotting scope because I keep my camp on my back. I'm just looking for information so I can try to strategically pick glassing spots on google earth. Thanks for any information and good luck to everyone this fall

 

[WI in the west]

edited cause my numbers were all messed up.
With my maven b2’s i use to have in 11x 2 miles i could see elk pretty well in the open feeding. With my 18x i saw them at 4+ miles feeding. Thats from a tripod and they were in more open sage. So they stick out good id guess you would see them a bit firther if your glassing slow and rock solid on a tripod, there color sticks out pretty well if there in the open

 

[WeiserBucks]

Quality 10x42's on a tripod will spot elk from several miles.