The Big Hunt

The amount of prep work for a Moose hunt is rather important. A Bull Moose can weigh in at over 1000 lbs, and if you don’t bring a winch, a trailer, and a crew you might be setting yourself up for an arduous event. The marksmanship training was complete and now it was time to rally the troops to our permitted zone up in The Forks, which is a location where the Dead River and the Kennebec connect. Fun fact – Maine has over one million acres of land for public use and is the most forested state in the U.S with over 17 million acres of woodland.

There are many ways a hunter might choose to approach their hunt, we went with the tried and true method of driving down the dirt roads. On the first day, within the first couple of hours, we came across a Bull moose – standing broadside – about half way up a hill. I got out of the truck, loaded my rifle, and took a knee; like I had done so many times before, the only issue was that the swale grass was much too tall to see anything. I told my father, “I can’t see anything.” He responded with, “Stand up.” An astute observation. I stood up and proceeded to fire at the moose. We practiced taking a knee so many times I wasn’t ready for the transition and missed my first shot. The moose started to turn and make its way up the hill and I fired again. The moose’s head swayed and slowed in its tracks. I fired again and its head swayed to the other side. My cardboard cut out never ran away! 

Finally, my older cousin who was driving us told my father who was my sub-permittee to “bear down on and shoot!” My father followed his instructions and hit the moose in the rear. There was an audible thwacking sound from his shot making contact. We tracked the moose up the hill, and I was able to put a kill shot into its neck. Once we knew the hunt was complete someone said, “What in the world were you aiming at?” I said, “ I was aiming for its head when it started to run away.” Turns out I was shooting the moose in the antlers as it ran – there are still chips in the antlers to this day. An incredible opportunity and experience to bag a 750 bull moose at 12 years old. The pictures highlight the impact on the left paddle (middle image) and the right paddle (last picture).