When a Moose Hunt Goes Click

by Dan Buss
(Qualicum Beach, BC Canada)

Dan "Click" the Moose Hunter

Well if anything is going to happen to someone, it will be me, no doubt. Well, I went hunting with Tom the door man up on Alaska Hwy.

It was a nice day so off we went on ATV's with our trailers full of gear to set up camp 10 k's in the back country. When we got the camp set up and got a fire going then out came some homemade spaghetti, then off to bed.

The next morning was fogged in so we stayed in camp till around noon, then we set off to see what was up in the rocky foothills. I dropped Tom off on this rocky ridge and said, "You stay here and look to see what's up".

I went south on that same ridge 2 miles down. After looking around for a few hours I decided to go in to a spot that had a lick.

As I was walking in to this moose lick I could hear some foot tracks to the east of me. I just thought for a half a minute it was a moose, in this area I've been in there a 100 times. I walked in and it was so dry out you could hear a pin drop at 200 yards, as I was walking I began to think that does not sound like a moose.

Whatever it was I knew it was not a moose at this point. So I came up with what it had to be was a grizzly. I was not all that concerned. I just said to myself he's got 80 yards to go to get me and I would have drop him on the spot with my 338 win mag Remington 700 with 225 grain pointed soft point boat tail. He would have dropped on the spot. But as I went in to the lick and looked around there was nothing to see so I decided to get out of there as this grizzly was still looking at me as a meal.

Not to fear I started back out to the Honda, and as I was half way back you could hear that grizz following me back to the bike. I finally made it back with not wasting any time I fired up the quad and scooted back to see Tom as it was around 7.00pm. Anyways back at camp Tom said he had seen three bulls, 6 cows, 1 elk and 1 grizzly up high.

He said one moose was a Boon and Crocket.

Off to bed after dinner, up the next day and its foggy again so off at noon to look for mister Boon and Crocket. Tom's on the ridge as I was but I cannot sit for hours on end, at 1.30 pm I said I'm going to go up to the top of the mountain.

As I came back down I got Tom on the radio and at the same time I noticed the fog had lifted "come in Tom what's going on" he said "well that big bull is out in the middle of the slash" so I said "can you see me?" and "what elevation am I to the moose?" He said "your just fine go in to the bush until you come out to the slash".

So off I went 20 minutes later here's the slash, I got out my lookers and sure enough there's the big guy just a raking up a tree but he was 600 hundred yards up hill.

I went back into the bush, as I got close I got on to a moose trail and kept one eye on the ground and one to the right. I was walking up hill on this trail and all of a sudden I hit something with my head and I was buried into the side of something when I put up my left hand up I started to feel hair at that point I almost had a heart attack.

It was right turn Clyde and move... and keep your head down or you're going to lose it. When I got out about 40 yards I slowly looked back and not believing I had not gotten whacked by a grizz I see a cow moose standing in the same spot looking at me as if to say to me "can you not look out where you are going mister?"

It was a great relief that there was no grizzly.
I carried on I looked up and the big guy was not there, so I looked around and said to myself "where would you go to lay down" I saw a spot and I said to myself "let's sneak over there for a look".

As I had to walk up a little bit of a hog's back I would stop and scan up a bit more then all of a sudden there were his horns, he was laying down with his back to me. I said perfect this moose is dead. He had a rack I kid you not I could have laid across it no problem. He had about a 72 inch rack.

As I was about to shoot I had to stand on my toes a bit for elevation to shoot over this ridge and as I did a stick broke in the moss, Crack and up he got standing no more than 40 feet looking at me. I put that 338 right to his forehead for a shot between the eyes.

CLICK... What do you mean click? I pump another shell in and click again, this happened to all 4 shells!

He's still standing there, I'm checking out all my shells and they all looked like they should have fired. I'm at a loss here so I picked up one shell that was on the ground put in the chamber again, at this point I was shaking so bad I said shoot him in the lungs, pulled the trigger and pow.

Lots of smoke and the bullet hit the ground in front of him. His eyes were as big as pie plates, a left turn and he was gone downhill.

So I was on the radio "Hey Tom where is that moose?" he said "You might as well forget him he's out of the country".

Tom said he's never seen a moose move that fast in his life. Two days later Tom got his moose.

This is a true story. Best regards Dan, Click...

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