H
Huntintoo
Guest
I had been putting in for Moose for a few years and was gaining points for the Ogden drainage. Then I saw him a Bull Moose that rivaled anything I had ever seen in Utah. I began applying for the tag on Deseret Land and Livestock. 13 years later I was ecstatic when I drew out for this tag. Though it is a state tag the Landowners permits sell for $11,500.00. My State price $408.00 for this "ONCE-IN-A-LIFETIME" tag. Like their CWMU (Cooperative Wildlife Management Unit) bull elk tags the Moose tag is a Guided and Logged Hunt. I was put in the PECK room with my guide. Day one, we went to see several areas on the 290,000 acre ranch and looked at a bunch of Bull Moose, several large deer and a bunch of trophy elk. I told my Guide that I had already named my moose Mickey for Mickey Moose. As we looked at each bull I would ask, "Is that Mickey?" We would both say, "That's not Mickey!" Though one was about a 140 inch bull, we called him a Friday bull, meaning we would come back Friday if there was not a bigger bull seen through the week. We saw 7 different bulls that night. The next morning we were back at it and saw several more Bulls, On the way back to the lodge for lunch I realized that I had seen 9 bulls and 3or 4 cows that morning. Wow, what a selection! I asked if we could go to that area where I had seen the largest bull I had ever seen 13 years earlier. The guide obliged and took me there. We watched the water hole for about 40 minutes realizing it was hot and the Big Black moose would wait to come out of the trees until just before dark or just after dark. We looked it up and found that shooting time was over at 08:28pm. We went to the area at about 07:00 and played the waiting game. As we watched the pond we decided to Range how far away it was. 741 yards. I was not comfortable with that distance as I had only shot out to 300 yards with my .375 Ruger and the 270 grain Barnes X bullet it was topped with. We moved closer. Ranged the Pond again and found it to be 501 yards. Still a little out of my range. There was not much cover so we started to move closer carefully. Then I noticed Movement above the water hole. Binoculars showed there were 2 Bull Elk above the water hole. One 6X6 and a rag horned 4X5. As we moved so did the elk. Then I noticed another figure moving toward the pond and it was Black. I stopped and stated that it was a moose coming to the pond. Bino's again confirmed it was a Moose but a COW! About 50 Yards behind the cow another, moose came out... We both looked through the bino's and then looked at each other and said together, "That's Mickey!" The cow and Bull went straight to the water and put their heads down to drink. When they did we moved closer, when they looked up we would stop. My guide said How far now? I ranged it at 274 yards. He said, "If you feel OK about the shot take it now!" As I put the rifle up the bull faced us and there was no broad side shot and the guide asked me to wait for him to turn. After what seemed to be forever he took a slight turn to our Left. I placed the 300 yard cross hairs of my shepherd scope on in the middle of the bull behind the front shoulder. I knew it would hit him high because the actual range was only 274 yards. A slow controlled press of the trigger dropped the bull right in the middle of the pond!!!! As I got closer he got bigger! He was enormous! A few wild cries later, and some work to get him out of the pond. I tagged him and he was mine!
