Highs and lows of moose searching – Ontario OUT of DOORS

The superior dimension and majesty of the moose makes it each the best of Ontario’s searching animals and probably the most difficult.

There are few moose hunts that don’t embody nice highs and a few severe lows. But, all of them make for memorable experiences. Typically you get a moose, typically you don’t. Every hunt is exclusive.

I didn’t develop up in a moose-hunting home. Gord Sr. was a deer hunter, however searching the swamp donkey was not on his radar. Nonetheless, his father Ora Ellis had hunted moose fairly a bit, and travelled from the household farm in Smithville to the wilds of Longlac searching for moose. In my assortment of searching pics of Ora, I’ve certainly one of him standing subsequent to an unlimited cow moose he harvested. The animal is complete and is hanging in a barn. It seems three occasions as giant as my grandfather. This image was etched into my thoughts at an early age. How may anybody even transfer a moose that giant, by no means thoughts dangle it complete? What was the magic trick?

Moose searching curiosity advanced

Regardless of my curiosity in them, I didn’t begin searching moose till I used to be practically 30. Relationship my now-wife, Cheryl, put me on the moose-hunting trajectory. Her grandfather, Ed Marsh, liked to moose hunt and had many nice tales of epic outings. He had a number of dozen moose to his credit score. But by the point I obtained to hunt with him, when he was in his late 70s, Ed was largely driving his truck round on bush roads listening to nation music. An enjoyable time, however not how I needed to hunt. He was a wealth of information, nonetheless, and I discovered lots. Ed additionally purchased me my first moose gun — a Remington 30.06 — as a result of “I wanted one thing respectable.” When he obtained too previous to hunt, he bought me his beloved bolt-action Sako 30.06.

I nonetheless personal each weapon and cherish them.

The following step in moose searching was to search out like-minded people to hitch the chase within the bush. My late good friend and out of doors author from Thunder Bay, Russ Swerdlyk, was an eager hunter. He favored to hunt within the snow — typically with snowshoes — and most popular to do small pushes. It was a full-on cardio blast sort of searching. He and I’d head out to a space close to Canine River, north of Thunder Bay, and spend the day following moose tracks and working the bush. Though Swerdlyk and I by no means killed a moose collectively, we had some wild issues happen.

One memorable time, he did a push via a bit of swamp that opened into a big cutover. The denuded space had some brush and shrubs, however appeared largely open. There have been bull tracks heading into the woodlot, however none out. I sat on an excessive level of the lower and Russ went in to push. About quarter-hour in, there have been just a few loud cracks that signaled a moose was shifting. I by no means noticed a factor, nonetheless. After about 40 minutes, Russ appeared and was waving at me. This was within the pre-radio/walkie talkie days, so I went over to speak to him.

“Why didn’t you shoot,” he stated.

“At what?” I replied.

“The bull I kicked up. It went your method.”

We went to search for tracks and found there was a ravine hidden within the lower. That little creek bed offered an escape route for the bull. There was simply sufficient brush to display the motion of an 800-pound animal. It had crossed the lower all proper, about 250 yards from me, however had snuck via like a ghost. Appears unimaginable, nevertheless it occurred.

Group shaped

Within the early Nineties, I started chasing deer with a man named Wealthy Brochu, who I met whereas searching close to Thunder Bay. Someday within the late Nineties, we put a small moose searching group collectively made up of members of the family and a pair pals. It was during these early moose hunts that I killed my first two bulls in WMU 15B. Brochu had a pleasant piece of property in WMU 13, and a few fascinating moose hunts occurred there as properly. One that stands out befell throughout a snow hunt within the mid 2000s.

I’d snowmobiled up a path to a sequence of browse-wealthy hills that held moose late within the season. There was a bull tag in my pocket burning a gap and never many dates left on the calendar. I parked the sled and started strolling alongside the sting of a hill choked with pink willow. A cow and bull had been feeding right here, and the recent tracks and steaming droppings spiked my coronary heart price. The animals had been shut. It’s superb how the searching senses go into overdrive when you realize the sport is in play. My eyes slowly scanned the horizon for any darkish shapes standing out towards the white snow. The tracks disappeared over a knoll and went down into some thicker woods. I fastidiously adopted the tracks, stopping to look and hear after just a few steps.

Then there was a crack.

These moose had been within the thick stuff about 100 yards beneath my place down a hill. I noticed the cow first, standing vast open and broadside. Then there was a flash of antler. I put the scope up, discovered the antler, then the top of the bull. The physique was screened. By way of the scope, I may even see one eye of the bull. Nonetheless, there was no clear shot. The cow began to stroll, and the bull adopted, disappearing like a ghost. The comb was shifting, and snow fell from branches because the pair vanished into the woods. 

Oh, I did try to comply with them, nevertheless it was hopeless within the thick cowl.

The bull tag went unfilled that yr., however that second is endlessly.

Simply a part of the magic of moose searching. Check out my epic adventure in BC

Initially revealed within the Fall 2023 subject of Ontario OUT of DOORS

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