sfletch

Hey Team,

Sorry it’s been awhile. Have been kepping busy with work, church (adding on to building), School board, Family and of course hunting.
I've been out 7 or 8 times, seen deer all but one time. Lots of does and fawns and several bucks. Have not had any shooter in range yet but hopefully one will give me a shot. Put one doe in the freezer and looking to put up a few more. Have seen a piebald 8 point twice already, I will have to sacrifice my tag if he gives me a good shot. Hope all of you Rackmasters are enjoying or will start enjoying some hunting time soon.

JeramyK

Hey sfletch. Glad to see you've been seeing some deer. Hopefully you'll get that shot you're waiting for. Keep us posted and good luck!

JeramyK

Well, I put a doe down this morning around 8am. She's currently at the butcher awaiting processing. It'll be nice to have meat in the freezer. 2 more doe tags and 1 buck tag to go!

sfletch

JeramyK,
Congrates on the doe. It is always good to get some venison in the freezer.The deer are starting to move good here with the cooler rainy weather. I will get out Friday afternoon and Sunday afternoon.

Good hunting

JeramyK

I'll be out tomorrow morning for a few hours so hopefully I'll get lucky again. There's supposedly a couple bruisers on the property that I'm hunting but so far they've only been seen at night while spotting.

MEhuntalot

Hey guys...finally got back to school after a LOOOONG week of hunting! The moose hunt was a success, although my pockets are now empty!

I can post the whole story and pictures if you are interested...just let me know!

I could have drilled a small buck yesterday but I already have PLENTY of meat in the freezer so I decided to hold out for more points!

JeramyK

Congrats ME! I'd love to hear the story and see the pics of the moose hunt.

I'll be back out on stand tomorrow and Tuesday mornings. Hopefully things will be better than yesterday. I had some guy walk straight through the trail I was watching yesterday morning at about 7am and he proceeded to make noise as he setup a stand 50 yards away from me. Needless to say I saw no deer activity. [&:] On top of that yesterday was opening day of our week long muzzleloader season. There were shots ringing out all morning till about 10am. [>:] Hopefully those guys will all be back at work tomorrow. And hopefully our pre-rut starts kicking in soon.

alwyshntn

STORY! STORY! STORY!

I'm ready lay it on us....

Congrats on the doe JeramyK...


I've been workin alot lately and haven't got to visit the site lately...Going north to our lease this next weekend to hunt and then one more week and it's off to IOWA !!! Can't wait

MEhuntalot

Story it is then!

Alrighty then...my father and I both got drawn for moose permits in northern maine (not very good odds to begin with...father and son is quite rare!) We get up to the camp around 4 o'clock sunday afternoon and get all unpacked and start to finalize our game plan. It wasnt a very good outlook weather-wise as we were only supposed to have 2 sunny days all week. So monday came with much anticipation...we woke to a heavy drizzle/light rain (miserable conditions) and a morning temp. of 40 degrees. We headed to our hunting zone which was about 20 minutes from camp...not even a mile down the road we spot a dark blob in the road, it ended up being a cow (female moose). Another 5 miles down the road we saw another cow and then we finally made it to our zone. We both had bull permits and I made the decision to let my father shoot first seeing as though he may never get drawn again. We hunted the rest of monday without much action...we did see a young bull but we spooked him pretty hard as he was right on a corner. We managed to get a few Grouse that first day...so that kept us busy for a while.
Tuesday morning came with a much better outlook...same temperatures but without the rain. It was just overcast all morning. My dad and I took off and were heading to a "good-looking" road that we had found on the first day. We walked the road so we didnt make a lot of noise, we stopped every so often to call and thrash the bushes to mimmic a bull. We finished walking the road without anything happening, so we met back up with the other two guys we were up there with and decided that we should split up into 2 vehicles to cover more territory...we didnt get more than 2 miles down the main road and we spotted a moose crossing the road. We quickly verified that it was indeed a bull (albeit not a huge one) and we proceeded to walk down to where it had crossed the road...luckily he was just moping through a cutoff and we got him to stop...my dad made one heck of a shot with open sights on my .450 marlin at 150 yards. He double lunged the beast, but he still managed to go 100+ yards. When he finally hit the ground he was 1000 feet off the road with no trees to winch from (cutoff) As luck would have it a lumber company was working nearby and offered to drag it out with a skidder for a small fee ($100), so needless to say it was all dragged out in a timely fashion. We gutted it out and threw it in the back of my dads truck and headed back to camp. Dad came home to bring his moose to the butcher we wouldnt see him again till midday wednesday as it was a 6 hour drive each way to get home.

We went back out on Tuesday night for the last hour. 20 minutes into the night hunt we came up on another young bull, this one had bigger antlers than my dads but I felt confident we would find something bigger so I passed on him...we saw two cows and a young bear that night before it got dark.

Wednesday morning came without dad...but with excellent cool crisp weather. We saw 5 moose on the way to our zone. We got into the zone and drove the roads in the same area we saw the moose the night before. around 8 oclock we went down a great looking road with fresh tracks all along it. at 8:15 we were still inching down the same road...we came up over a rise and everyone in the truck yelled "BULLLL". We all saw it at the same time and I instantly knew it was a shooter. I got out of the truck and snuck around the back so he would not see me... I snuck down the road to within 75 yards before I let my first shot go (it was a direct hit as I later found out right behind the shoulder) but the enormous animal just stood there like nothing had happened...I jacked another shell in and ran closer to him thinking that I had missed...this time I had closed the gap to just 40 yards and he was still just standing there. I let another round go and it dropped him instantly when it hit him in the base of the neck. It didnt take me long to find out why he didnt move...when I turned around to see the reaction of my two hunting partners I was blinded by the sun...I couldnt see a thing, and the wind could not have been blowing better. We gutted my moose out and loaded him onto the trailer. When my dad got back to camp from his long ride it was time to turn around and drive back home...he was pissed!

My dads moosed dressed out at 503 lbs, and my moose dressed out at 850 lbs. with a 56" spread

Pictures will follow once I figure out how to decrease the size of them
--any suggestions would be great!

JeramyK

Awesome story ME! I can't wait to see the pictures. A big congrats to you and your dad!