Right place, right time...AK moose 2022 (aka the Golden Horseshoe...)

[Ryan Rothhaar]

Well I'm finally taking time to post this up, we need more hunting stories around here!

The moose trip was a little different this year....the pilot had an opening early season and encouraged us to take it. My buddy John and I would be flying in the last day of August and hunting the first 10 days of season, September 1-10. The rut would still be a couple weeks from starting, bulls would just be out of velvet, and rather than rut crazed moose looking to fight or breed we would be hunting bulls working on determining pecking order and coming off of summer patterns.  A huge part (really THE huge part) of DIY type hunting in AK is having a good transporter, and I think we have managed to luck into getting on with the best, so I wasn't going to argue with him.

We got into town a couple days early and with a good WX window the pilot flew us in 2 days before season, so we had a full extra day to get situated and get camp set and ready.  We were hunting in foothill country, pretty decent elevation, with the Cub strip on top of a ridge with camp right by it. Water was a 20 minute walk downhill, but easy to get to, and great with a spring coming right out of the ground so we didn't need to even filter.

Camp was a Sawtooth. With pretty tight weight restriction on the Super Cub flight, and no desire to pay for a gear flight, we kind of took it as a challenge and we each ended up a couple pounds light on gear

We threw a gear tarp over some old frame a previous hunter built to store food bags, our bows and extra stuff.

[Ryan Rothhaar]

We sometimes trade a saying around....to the effect of "Who has the Golden Horseshoe up their a$$ this year?"....Well this year it was my turn....

[MnFn]

Come on, now. I’m ready.

[Ryan Rothhaar]

We were in beautiful country to hunt moose, high and dry, really more like elk country in a way than what you think of as moose habitat. There were lots of moose around, though. There was a reason the landing strip was there, and the wet drainage to the west of camp held moose all the time. The amount of tracks, trails, and fresh moose sign in the old burn regrowth was unreal, and we were into moose consistently.  The weather was great, almost too nice, only getting frosty a couple nights with a few showers here and there.


Plenty berries around.....fortunately we ran into 0 bears, which was a bonus!

[Ryan Rothhaar]

[Ryan Rothhaar]

Hope dawns eternal...on opening day!

[Ryan Rothhaar]

Some of the days kind of run together, but we generally would set up in the brush on the side hill a few hundred yards above the wet drainage on trails and work to call moose up out of the drainage. We didn't want to go down in there both because we didn't want to spook moose out, and also it would entail a shorter pack out to move a moose back to the landing strip! One rule of thumb you need to realize when hunting moose is don't shoot one farther from camp than you want to carry him on your back!  Guys that have never fooled around with a moose think they are gonna cover miles and shoot one "way back in there"....be my guest. Having been involved in several moose packing adventures I have no illusions about how far I want to carry one....

[Ryan Rothhaar]

When the wind was wrong for the hillside we would go up behind camp and call. Really John was supposed to be up to shoot on this trip. We planned to trade off year by year, but if a bull wanted to commit suicide, well all bets were off then.

One afternoon I called a small bull in to 14 yards of John, a legal moose in an any bull area, but not what either of us were looking for.

Things were getting better day by day, and one morning in the fog we had a pretty exciting hunt. We had pretty much settled on positions on the hillside about 30 yards apart, at the same elevation, watching downslope with trails crossing in front and to the sides of both of us. We would trade off calling, mainly scraping brush with a cut off oil can on a stick or an old shoulder blade we found, with an occasional grunt thrown in.

[Ryan Rothhaar]

That morning was windstill and very foggy, visibility 25-30 yards at most. Right after I did a little brush raking a bull a hundred yards or so downhill towards the drainage started thrashing brush.  I'd thrash some, then he would answer...back and forth this went on for a little bit with him getting closer little by little.  At one point he was probably 30 yards downhill, equal distance between myself and John when all of a sudden John started bull grunting and tearing up brush!  I didn't know if he just woke up and realized the moose was there or what, I couldn't figure why he was calling like that when the bull was coming.  The bull in front started tearing up brush...then John let loose....then "John" started moving downhill towards the bull!  Duh...it dawned on me that another bull had come in close to John and the two moose were interacting!

The new bull went downhill and both quieted down...and I never laid an eye on either in the fog.  After things settled I sneaked over to see what happened and it turned out this second bull came in from uphill and went 30 yards or so on the other side of John, thrashing brush and grunting, but he never had a shot.  He said the bull was over 60 inches wide with long tines and velvet hanging off the tops.

[Ryan Rothhaar]

On the 6th, in the afternoon, things finally came together....
I did a little brush thrashing and thought I heard a grunt from behind me, uphill. I looked over to John and could see he was looking up there too, so figured I wasn't imagining things. I banged on the sapling a couple more times and got a good response back! A few grunts and thrashing brush and I was sure the bull was coming in. I got an arrow on the string and tried to peer through the 6 foot high regrowth. 

Pretty soon I could hear him walking....then horns popped up over the brush 25 yards uphill.  The bull was coming right at me and when he fully came over the hill into the open he was 10 yards away...head on. Not a monster bull, but big enough for me! He paused and was looking around trying to locate the other bull that had been thrashing brush. After a few seconds...here he comes! Still head on and closing. I wondered if I was going to have to spook this moose before he stepped on me.

[Ryan Rothhaar]

Fortunately the trail I was on in a little patch of bushes was partially blocked so the bull swerved slightly to his left and angled to pass me on my right as I was facing him. I could see he had his eyes rolled back with lots of white showing in the front, like moose do when they posture, and I just hoped he was out of his head enough that he wouldn't see me. I turned enough as he was walking by to get my left shoulder pointed at him, and had my bow up, waiting for him to get even enough with me to not be quartering on. I was standing up, trying to hide behind a REALLY sparse 3 foot high alder hoping he wouldn't see me.

This bull was so close it was unreal. At one point had I held my 64 inch recurve by one tip I could have touched his right antler with the other.

When he got as even with me as I could stand I lined up and right before I let the arrow go it went through my mind..."What if I shoot an arrow into him and he takes a swipe at me??!!"  😀

[Ryan Rothhaar]

Now a bull moose that close is a big target....but as Browning says..."It isn't easy to shoot an arrow when you are having a heart attack!"....Fortunately I did manage to hit the broad side of a barn and the arrow went in to just short of the feathers perfectly 1/3 up behind the front leg. The bull took off and vaulted over a five foot high blow down on the way out!

When I got out from behind my bush the bulls tracks from where he took off were 3 paces from my bush...10 feet from where I was standing when I shot.

The bull ran over just downhill of where John was standing about 20 yards and he was giving me the what's up? sign.  He knew I shot the moose but the side he could see was the opposite side and the arrow did not punch out.  Pretty soon the bull crashed, out of sight, but only 40 yards away.

[Ryan Rothhaar]

I know I had the Big Eyes...I was pretty amped up. It was the most exciting couple of minutes I've ever had with a bow in my hand. A few days later John said something to me about acting like a 13 year old with his first deer..probably true 😉

Well the fun was over and now the work begins....

The look on my face is..."Now what the hell did I do THAT for?"  😀

[ottertails]

Awesome, awesome!... You bet!   I'm envious.  You shook those buggars off when it counted and made the shot.  Big congrats! 

[Ryan Rothhaar]

John's birthday was the day before, and he said "What a birthday present to get to see my best friend shoot a bull moose!"  That meant a lot. I truly told him thanks too, because without him I wouldn't be there on that hunt.

We had 2-3 hours of daylight and got the bull 75% butchered, most of the meat packed a hundred yards uphill, then took one load to camp.  We had things in good shape to cool off but would have to go back in to the carcass in the morning to finish butchering and get the horns.

John lives in SW Montana, and has alot of grizzlies around home, and bad ones too as they know people mean picnic baskets. Not too many grizz here in Indiana, so I told him to just tell me what he wanted me to do and we would team up.  We went into the kill site in the morning pistols out, and talking / making noise and the good news no bears.

After a total of 10 hours butchering and packing the meat was back at the landing strip in great shape.  This moose was unbelievably fat, the fattest wild animal I've ever butchered.  The meat was prime, and we worked our way through 10 lbs of tenderloin  over the next 4 days

I shot the bull with a 61 lb bow, ILF riser by Chuck Hawes  (Chucks custom bows). Vapor carbonwoods and a big Snuffer weighted up to 690-700 grains.  I centered the bulls heart and the head stuck in an offside rib so tight I had to wiggle it free like it was stuck in wood.


5 hunts to AK (3 for moose, 2 for caribou) and I finally get to punch a tag!


Hard to tell, but there's about 500 lbs of meat under that tyvek.

[Ryan Rothhaar]

The hunting kind of wound down over the next few days with moose sightings going to 0.  The time of the year had come for the moose to move down country towards the river drainages to rut.

Next year will be another adventure....and it is John's turn! I hope about mid September next year we are popping advils from the pack out and toasting another great bull!

Ryan


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[kopfjaeger]

Awesome Ryan. Thanks for posting. 

[TIM B]

Ya awesome adventure and great pics!!
Thanks for the share
Tim B

[hawkeye n pa]

Awesome and congratulations.

[stevem]

Great story.  Thanks for sharing.