Phil from Maine

Congrats to you!! It is great to see that you had good luck as well..

My sub and I agreed long before the hunt the first bull we see would be taken. I regret that in some ways though as I wanted a big rack for a keep sake of our hunt.. I am still glad to get one as well as being able to give it a try anyways.. Here is the story to it and a pic to follow threw..

We started out around 15 minutes later than planned so we never really started hunting at the time I wanted to. We drove down a dirt road and stopped and talked to a logger and a mechanic that was working on a log truck. I asked them if they had been seeing any moose on the roads. They stated not for a while. The road that we was on we traveled for a total of 5 1/2 miles and turned left and drove for another 2 1/2 miles before turning a right into an old cutting from a year and a half ago. We drove into this road for roughly 1 mile and stopped to try calling as there was fresh moose tracks in the mud. ( I had found this place scouting earlier. )
I called and we wiated for about 15 minutes with a steady wind blowing. I did not think 1 would come to the calling because of the wind. We then drove into the rest of the road, which was about another mile. When we drove back out to where I was calling a moose was standing in the cutting. The moose was only about 20 yards from us but due to the leaves we couldn't see any antlers. So we thought this was a cow moose. I tried calling some more hoping to see a bull that I thought should of been with her. When she was about 45 yards I thought I could see a small set of antlers but wasn't sure. When it got out to around 65 yards on a ridge we both could see the antlers then.
My sub mentioned our agreement that the first bull we see would be shot. So I said go ahead then as that was what we had agreed to ealier on. He shot it with a Savage 30-06 using a 150 grain bullet. He shot it low into the front shoulder and the moose ran about another 65 yards into the woods. I went in and tracked it. It had left no blood trail but was fairly easy to find because of the size of its tracks. I came across some rasberry bushes that looked like the moose had a hard time going threw them. I turned and looked to my left and there was the moose laying there. It was killed by the first shot. Upon field dressing it I discovered both lungs to look OK as well as the heart. The bullet did enter the ribcage just in front of the heart and lungs so I am thinking he got lucky and hit the main artery to the heart and that is why it died quickly.
Now let me tell you trying to drag an animal this size out of the Maine woods up here is not an easy task. We did get him out after 5 1/2 hours of steady work using a come-a-long, chains, and rope. But we did it and mission accomplished even though I would of like to try for a bigger moose with a wall hanger rack that tourists would like as well as myself..

P.S. I was using a Quakerboy Cow Grunt tube that I purchased about 20 years ago and it still works great today. I let a friend use it ealier this year and he got a 6 pointer with it. He was very happy with the results of this call. Now he wants to record me using the call. So, that he can get one out during the rest of his hunts in the future. He is an Indian that can hunt yearly and is around 70 years old. I have known him for quite some time and we have been great friends over the years..