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Author Topic: Huckleberry early bull moose  (Read 13169 times)

Offline Rutnbuxnbulls

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Re: Huckleberry early bull moose
« Reply #75 on: October 12, 2024, 06:53:32 AM »
Shots wrong out at around 8:30 this morning. Been a long road to hoe. Still one more trip out with him. Story to come and what a story it is  :tup:

Way to stick it out Haase! A true testament to playing the long game.

Offline benhuntin

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Re: Huckleberry early bull moose
« Reply #76 on: October 12, 2024, 01:32:09 PM »
Saw one in a pickup coming out this morning. Wondering if it was you?  We are ready for pics.


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Offline 6haase6

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Re: Huckleberry early bull moose
« Reply #77 on: October 12, 2024, 10:23:41 PM »
Saw one in a pickup coming out this morning. Wondering if it was you?  We are ready for pics.


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Very well could have been. Green v10 with two guys in it possibly not to far behind a white side by side depending where you passed them.
Slinging arrows and flinging lead is in my blood!

Offline 6haase6

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Re: Huckleberry early bull moose
« Reply #78 on: October 13, 2024, 12:23:52 AM »
I had been jumping around to different areas trying to find better moose activity, my go to had cooled off and all I was seeing was the same cows and small bulls. I found a drainage that bad two small bulls in it two days in a row showing signs of rut still so I made the decision to stake it out at first light and see if there was anything bigger in there that I had just been missing cause it went to bed early or came out later than I was there. First light came and all that showed was a single cow so I decided to high tail it back to my usual haunts just in case today was the day one of the two bulls showed themselves again. In the way back there is a spot you can see into it not a whole lot of it but what you can see it gives you a totally different view than what I usually have so I stopped to glass. Boom there’s a cow, so scramble for the tripod to start picking the timber apart, tripod is setup and binos steady on the cow to start my process with her as my center. Not seconds after setting up I catch paddles going through the bushes at the bottom of the binos. So adjust and steady on him and instantly could see the scissored front and knee it was one I had been chasing. Click the button on the sigs 1400 yards so throw the phone on to catch a few seconds of video, then turn to onX to figure out my move to get closer. The ridge just ahead of me drops from the road and parallels the ridge he’s on but he’s heading up and getting close to where it y’s with a knife ridge between us. The race was on to move down the ridge and setup before he went behind the knife ridge and out of my life for the day yet again. As luck would have it still being 1000 yards away he makes the turn down and slips behind the knife ridge well before I was in place for a shot, well nothing to lose I might as well push forward and get into a position close enough and try some calling and just maybe be will investigate and give me a chance. Working my way down the ridge and find a place I like and a down tree suitable for a rifle rest that gets me above all the brush, get all set and let out a few long whiney cow calls. Wait wait wait and wait some more only for nothing to show, start to think he’s given me the slip again, a few desperation bull grunts and then straight to the binos picking apart both the knife ridge and his original ridge line. Boom there’s a black body standing at the point of the knife ridge look over the drainage trying to find what was making the noise, leaning on the tree to steady the binos there’s good paddles, then there’s the scissor front it’s game time. Hit the range then settle into the rifle and lined up the shot, settle your breathing and easy on the trigger, bang with the suppressor I can hear the bullet fly with no whap. Re-range just to check yup I’m good, check my drop chart yup I’m good, check the bubble level oh no the rifle is canted. Missed wide right squaring up the rifle and re settling in target ease into the trigger bang whap back on target to see him fall and a big cloud of dust as he hits the ground and kicks his legs. Still in the gun and on target my heart begins to race I really just did it, I filled my once in a lifetime bull moose tag. A few minutes go by and I start to take down my shooting station in preparation to hike over to my trophy, as I’m putting things away and putting my binos harness back on I catch black movement from where he fell. Throw the binos up and sure enough it’s him just getting back to his feet, it’s a mad dash to get set back up only to rush the shot and another shot with no whap. Stop to settle my nerves and process where the impact landed I don’t see any bum legs or any sign of injury as he works up the ridge making my current location blocked with brush for any more shots. So I move up the ridge to find a down tree with a root ball that made a better shooting table than you can buy, I setup and wait for him to walk himself into an opening slightly quarter away, range, check dope chart, level the rifle and settle boom whap. Another good impact increases his speed and over the ridge he goes to not show himself again. I quickly pick out land markers and jump to onX to drop a pin, then send out the help needed text and start my trek to the ridge he was on. Follow my pin yes this looks right, start doing circles looking for blood or him. Nothing so I start to glass the creek bottom and next ridge with still no sign of him. My brother finally gets there after the longest hour of my life to glass from higher above me as I start the gridding process through brush that would hide a standing moose let alone a wounded one holding tight or a dead one. After hours of searching both ridge lines and the creek bottom my brother and I meet up and decide he will work back up my ridge to my pin to check for blood again and I will work up his ridge to the side by side. If he can’t find anything he will head to the road and we will start glassing the basin as a whole to see if he made a longer dash than we expected. We could see a line in the brush coming down the ridge that looked to be an old skidder road or some sort of trail leading right to my pin, so off my brother goes with his route in sight and I start up my side going slow and glassing incase he jumps the bull. Five hours into our search efforts and the sickest I’ve ever been in my life knowing I either just killed a moose and we will find him to late or there is one suffering in a thicket only to succumb to the injuries and the varmints will get him. My brother disappears over the top of the ridge and realization of this bull being lost I decide that I will stay on the drainage for the rest of the day and continue until the animals show me where he is and if that brings nothing then my tag goes unused. It was a hard long thought out decision but what I felt was right, I knew my hits were solid and would take his life so the right thing to do was not pursue another animal. As I sat down on a stump and glassed more hoping for some sort of a sign, a paddle sticking up that we missed or some sort of black patch that was actually a moose and not a burned stump I catch movement at the top of the ridge. It’s my brother waving his hands for me to come to him, I holler asking if he found him and if he’s dead. Know full well he could hear me and no vocal response just continued waving he’s hands i knew the answer was he was still alive. I moved as fast as my burnt out legs would allow. Getting to my brother he pointed to a thicket and I could see them his top points sticking above the brush, I setup and get in the ready for him to try and stand up at less that 30 yards. We tried a cow call he’d move his head but would stand, ok next a grunt still nothing. I told my brother to crinkle a water bottle, this got a little more if a reaction he picked his head up so we could see most of his antlers and the tops of his ears. After a few seconds back down they went. Know where his neck and head would be I told my brother to do it again and when he raised I’d pick a hole in the bushes and shoot him in the back of the neck. Worked just like we planned and we had a dead moose 8 hours after my first hit. More help was already on their way and would be to us in less than an hour. We start the brake down process and found the second shot entrance, right behind the shoulder right at a third of the way down from the spine ok with it quartered maybe only got one lung but 8 hours seems like a liming time to live on one lung. As I skinned the front should I find the bullet from from the first hit rear of the shoulder dead center up and down, fast forward to the other side no exit from the second shot and the first shot entrance was just in front of the shoulder. Help arrives and we finish braking him down and first packs start up the hill while I caped the head and prepped for their return and the final loads to go out. Figuring they should be back anytime I get the phone call telling me to start biking out the final quarter cause the trek out is by far worse than what we had figured. First trip out took just over three hours, after their return we cut the antlers of the skull and loaded the final packs to start up the hill. Not sure how long the second trip took but as we dropped packs at the pickup we got to start to watch the sun rise. 22 hours from first shot to last packs in the pickup, I’ve been apart of some really crappy pack outs and this was one for the books.
Slinging arrows and flinging lead is in my blood!

Offline 6haase6

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Re: Huckleberry early bull moose
« Reply #79 on: October 13, 2024, 12:27:02 AM »
.
Slinging arrows and flinging lead is in my blood!

Offline 6haase6

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Re: Huckleberry early bull moose
« Reply #80 on: October 13, 2024, 12:28:21 AM »
.
Slinging arrows and flinging lead is in my blood!

Offline 6haase6

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Re: Huckleberry early bull moose
« Reply #81 on: October 13, 2024, 12:32:21 AM »
.
Slinging arrows and flinging lead is in my blood!

Offline Ghost Hunter

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Re: Huckleberry early bull moose
« Reply #82 on: October 13, 2024, 04:28:20 AM »
Congratulations!!  Everyone's dream and a memory that will last a lifetime.  Great bull.
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Online teanawayslayer

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Re: Huckleberry early bull moose
« Reply #83 on: October 13, 2024, 06:08:01 AM »
Many crazy fronts! Very cool bull congrats!
Happiness is being in the woods!!!

Offline cjensen

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Re: Huckleberry early bull moose
« Reply #84 on: October 13, 2024, 06:27:44 AM »
Very nice bull!  Great job!

Offline jrebel

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Re: Huckleberry early bull moose
« Reply #85 on: October 13, 2024, 06:30:05 AM »
Excellent bull….congrats. 

Offline Caseknife

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Re: Huckleberry early bull moose
« Reply #86 on: October 13, 2024, 07:49:30 AM »
Way to keep after it, great bull.  Agree with your thought process about notching your tag if you weren't able to recover him.  Hard decision for sure on an OIL tag, or any tag for that matter.  I was prepared to do it on my goat if he had made it off the unrecoverable cliff.

Offline 6haase6

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Re: Huckleberry early bull moose
« Reply #87 on: October 13, 2024, 08:22:01 AM »
Way to keep after it, great bull.  Agree with your thought process about notching your tag if you weren't able to recover him.  Hard decision for sure on an OIL tag, or any tag for that matter.  I was prepared to do it on my goat if he had made it off the unrecoverable cliff.

I think it being an oil made it easier in my mind. I guess it was probably more of seeing the quality bull numbers of an oil species.
Slinging arrows and flinging lead is in my blood!

Offline Falcon

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Re: Huckleberry early bull moose
« Reply #88 on: October 13, 2024, 11:14:11 PM »
Huge congrats on filling your tag.   Glad the game dept gives you a month to hunt because finding mature bulls requires you to cover huge amounts of country.  Nice job on your cool looking bull :drool:
Cast all your anxiety upon him, for he cares for you.    1 Peter 5:7

Online Mfowl

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Re: Huckleberry early bull moose
« Reply #89 on: October 15, 2024, 07:41:45 PM »
Gorgeous bull! Congrats on filling your tag!
Fish hard, hunt harder!

 


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