What a rush me and my buddy "Old Quee" (Lee) had never successfully called in a bush moose before. We were hunting an area which I'd never been to, Quee had hunted this zone before but not this particular area. We found a couple of spots with lots of tracks and attempted calling from them. The one place we called in a bull on Tuesday but due to a case of "bull fever" we never connected on him. We were kicking ourself after looking back and rethinking our strategy, we both decided as aggresively as he had cover the last 300 yards to the cutline we should have continued to call and gotten him closer before we attempted a shot.
Nothing showed on Wed as the wind was blowing too hard for us to call effectively, so we took the afternoon off and put the boat in and caught a few pike. Man there's nothing like fresh fish when your out hunting, Yummy! After supper while getting my butt kicked at dice we contemplated our strategy for the final full day of our hunt. Thursday brought more wind but you can't sit in the cabin on the last day so we headed out. We decided to go straight to the "spot". We pulled up on the rise above the "squishy stuff" and waited 10-15min before calling. Normally "Old Quee" calls but the last time we had that bull show up I had grabbed the horn and called right before he appeared. Well I let loose with a cow call that can only be described as a combination of school girl meets choir boy. It was brutal! After laughing hysterically and throwing the call to the ground we waited a few minutes and "Old Quee" let loose with a series of cow calls and bull grunts. We took our seats off of our quads and set down behind our quads out of the wind to enjoy a cup of java and a snack from "Old Quee's" tickle trunk. We sat chatting for about 40 mins. With no sign of the wind letting up we decided to move up the cutline. I had just put my rifle back into my scabbard when "Old Quee" shouted "MOOSE"! Thinking he was just screwing around I didn't believe him, that was until I looked at his face his eyes were huge and the panic as he tried to jack a shell in was proof enough. I turned and sure as hell there was a bull walking across the line, about 175 yards away. After 2 shots (one from Lee's 270 and one from my 300) and what seemed like 2 seconds it was all over. We ran down to where we had seen him and he hadn't even made it to the bush line. You would have thought we'd just won the lottery, hands shakes and back slapping hootin and hollerin. Then the work began. My stinkin disposable camera crapped out with 14 exposures left on it after I took the first pic. So theother picis after we had gutted him and drug him back to camp (with quads). With only one minor panic attack when we got stuck in the squishy stuff we got him back to camp without incident.The loader was there from last winter when the cabin we were staying in was built. We found the keys turned it over and amazingly enoughit started, it made hanging him and skinning/quartering a breeze!
This hunt also included me rolling a bear but he got up and took off. With fresh snow and good blood sign(looked like lung blood) we thought for sure he was done. But after tracking him for 500 yards in the bush the snow ran out and we ran out of sign. I have no idea where I hit him (I was aiming for the sweet spot)but after the shot he did the funky chicken and ran over the ridge, I was sure he would be dead on the other side, but he was either tougher than I thought or I didn't hit him as hard as it looked. At one point he walked on top of a fallen tree for 30 ft. When I saw this I figured we weren't going to catch up to him. Unfortunately I was right. I guess my dream of takng a bear will have to wait until next spring.
What a bitter / sweet trip I can't wait to get back up there next year.
Moose Success!
Logged
