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Ugliest Hunting Story!
Special Operations
Member Posts: 25 ✭✭
Being pretty much new here, and seeing some pretty great posts on various topics, I thought I might share this story...and see how many other similar stories there out there. This was a very memorable experience...FOR SURE. See if you can top this one.
Once, a few years ago, I was elk hunting in my home state of Wyoming. I had also drawn a moose tag (cow tag) that year. I had been out for about 4 days and hadn't seen ANYTHING! This was a great area too! Lot's of tracks, heard lots of them, but nothing to shoot at. I was BUMMED!
Anyway, it was getting late on my last day. It was pretty cold too (probably about 0). I decided to head back. After a while I got back to my truck and started to drive back to camp. About a mile from my camp I see this moose standing on the edge of a clearing about 60 yards away. I'm thinking...EUREKA!!
I stop the truck all quiet like, get out, jack a shell in my 300 Weatherby Mag and BANG! Life is REALLY GOOD right at this moment. She takes about one step and drops. Things are LOOKIN' UP! No doubt I'm gonna' be late for work the next day, but at least I'll be smiling (or so I think)!
I go back to the truck and start getting all my stuff ready to dress her out. Because she fell in a snow drift, and it's pretty near the road, I decide to winch her across the clearing with my truck so she's next to the road (this is a back country road). I move my truck into position, and about that time I notice that the snow drift she fell in is getting smaller (bad sign), and the area around her is getting darker (worse sign). About the same time, I hear this squeaking sound, then a pop...the front of my truck drops up to the bumper in mud (not good). I'm only 20 feet off the road, BUT I'm also unknowingly on a sheet of ICE over a shallow bog! SO IS THE MOOSE! Things are not looking good at this moment.
Within a minute or so, the ice under where the moose fell begins to crack and she starts to sink (the water was only about 10" deep).
I won't bore you with all the details, but I spent the next 22 HOURS knee deep in ice water and mud getting the moose out, my truck unstuck, my buddy's truck unstuck, a Fish and Game warden's truck unstuck who happened by for the all the fun...all while freezing to DEATH from being SOAKED, head to toe!!
To this day, I don't think I've ever worked so hard, nor been so cold or tired! THAT was an experience I wouldn't care to repeat! The moose was GREAT though!
Once, a few years ago, I was elk hunting in my home state of Wyoming. I had also drawn a moose tag (cow tag) that year. I had been out for about 4 days and hadn't seen ANYTHING! This was a great area too! Lot's of tracks, heard lots of them, but nothing to shoot at. I was BUMMED!
Anyway, it was getting late on my last day. It was pretty cold too (probably about 0). I decided to head back. After a while I got back to my truck and started to drive back to camp. About a mile from my camp I see this moose standing on the edge of a clearing about 60 yards away. I'm thinking...EUREKA!!
I stop the truck all quiet like, get out, jack a shell in my 300 Weatherby Mag and BANG! Life is REALLY GOOD right at this moment. She takes about one step and drops. Things are LOOKIN' UP! No doubt I'm gonna' be late for work the next day, but at least I'll be smiling (or so I think)!
I go back to the truck and start getting all my stuff ready to dress her out. Because she fell in a snow drift, and it's pretty near the road, I decide to winch her across the clearing with my truck so she's next to the road (this is a back country road). I move my truck into position, and about that time I notice that the snow drift she fell in is getting smaller (bad sign), and the area around her is getting darker (worse sign). About the same time, I hear this squeaking sound, then a pop...the front of my truck drops up to the bumper in mud (not good). I'm only 20 feet off the road, BUT I'm also unknowingly on a sheet of ICE over a shallow bog! SO IS THE MOOSE! Things are not looking good at this moment.
Within a minute or so, the ice under where the moose fell begins to crack and she starts to sink (the water was only about 10" deep).
I won't bore you with all the details, but I spent the next 22 HOURS knee deep in ice water and mud getting the moose out, my truck unstuck, my buddy's truck unstuck, a Fish and Game warden's truck unstuck who happened by for the all the fun...all while freezing to DEATH from being SOAKED, head to toe!!
To this day, I don't think I've ever worked so hard, nor been so cold or tired! THAT was an experience I wouldn't care to repeat! The moose was GREAT though!
Comments
You doing anymore Moose hunting?
"the difference between the almost right word and the right word is like the difference between a lightning bug and a lightning bolt" - Mark Twain.
I put in a couple times, but I was never drawn after that (perhaps fortunately for me...[:D] ). I wasn't trying real hard though.
The worst part of the whole ordeal was that I couldn't really tell it was ice. It was all crusted over with snow, just like the surrounding ground and brush sticking up through it. Should have known with a moose though, but live and learn I guess! I went back the next spring and it was as dry as a bone (as it had been in the years previous). You could still even see our tracks...and holes...and footprints...and face prints...and...[:D]
TOOLS
General TOOLS RRG
Don't go blaming the beer. Hank Hill
So much Ice, So much Beer. So little time. Shooter4
I don't have an anger problem. I have an idiot problem. Hank Hill
When I was a child, I thought as a child. But now that I am grown, I just wish I could act like a child and get away with it.
Like in the NFL, defense is the key.
Mad Dog