duckslayer56
Active Member
Just got back yesterday from a month in Alaska. I tried to get out and hunt or fish every day I was there. Only had a couple down days, where weather sucked, or just had too much other stuff to do.
I fly in around 2 AM and my buddy who I was staying with tells me to get some sleep because we've got to help his friend with his goat tag first thing when we wake up. I had a few days until we were going to get into the bush for my moose hunt so I had no problem with that. Next morning we wake up to bright blue skies and low 70s weather. We hiked in about 4 miles to find him already rafting out to the trail head with a goat in his raft. He had hiked in the day before, and set up camp. Woke up that morning and had a billy standing about 600 yards above him. He made a short stalk and boom, goat down! He couldn't raft farther so we split the load of his goat and hiked out 4 miles with heavy packs.
The next day we woke up sore and tired, but heard the silvers were really in down in Seward, and it's legal to snag them from the beach. We packed up rods and tackle and hit the road. When we got to Seward and started fishing, but we heard we should have been there yesterday (story of my life). Apparently people were limiting out in 7 casts, unfortunately that wasn't the case this day. I think out of the 5 of us who went, we only got 2 fish. Better than being skunked though.
I decided to hit the Parks highway the next day and see if there were any salmon left in some of my old favorite rivers up there. Low and behold there were still fish running in Montana creek. I caught several silvers, but most were too red to keep, but found a few that were good. Caught a few chum salmon as well, but in all my years in AK, I've yet to find a way to cook chums that makes them taste good, so those were all released. Ended up going home with 3 silvers that day. This was the last day I fished, it was a hunting trip from then on out.
We loaded up our gear, fueled the truck, and loaded our rangers on the trailer and headed North for the moose hunt. My buddy only had 4 days of vacation so we needed to get it done quick. He was also looking to get his daughter into hunting so we took her along, and at the last minute our friend in Healy asked if we could take his daughter because she wanted to go. I have no problem taking kids hunting so I said it was fine.
After about 300 miles of driving we arrived in the town of Healy. Our friend works in the mine there and was able to get us into the back side of the mine where there weren't a lot of people. We spend the night in his camp trailer and hit the trail at about 6 AM. About a half an hour before daylight. It took us about 30 min to get up to the spot were we wanted to camp. We pulled into the spot, shut off the rangers and started glassing but didn't see any moose. Kind of disappointed to not even see a cow in the area, but we had time. As we discussed how we were going to set up camp we heard an antler scrape off to our right! I rushed over with my binos and low and behold there were 4 bull moose standing in the trees with 3 cows! A quick look at them and I saw a bigger bull, a bull with a broken horn, a small paddle bull, and a spike.
I was kinda disappointed to see a bull in an area where he was reachable so early in the hunt. I like to hunt for the adventure, and shooting a bull an hour into the trip kinda bummed me out. As I thought about it, I was like, well am I here to hunt moose, or here to glass moose! The stalk was on at that point, I had about a 3/4 of a mile to get to the bulls, and some swampy country to cross to get to them. I hit the ATV trail and got about half the distance closed, then set in cross country. There was a draw between me and the spot I wanted to shoot from, but as I got over the small hill and started down the draw I discovered another cow moose standing there watching me. I had to back out before she spooked the other moose off. I backed out, and circled around her, but at this point I saw the group of bulls had walked a little ways down hill. I saw a ridge that was to their right. I figured if I could get up to that ridge, walk down to the area they were in I would have a pretty easy shot at them. I hustled my butt up to that ridge and climbed up. Once I got to the top I couldn't see the moose, I figured they had walked a little farther down hill, so I started to slowly walk in their direction. About a 1/4 mile down the ridge suddenly I saw a cow to my right, she was looking the other way, but still no bulls. I sat tight for a minute, the wind was in my face, and they didn't know I was there so I figured I'd wait it out and see what was going on. About a minute or two more of waiting and I spot the little paddle bull about 80 yards in the trees. I got up and started slowly making my way toward him. The bigger bull in the group had given me the slip, I think he saw me earlier and booked it out of there, but as I made my way towards that paddle bull I saw the spike, and then as I got around a tree, there was the broken horn bull 20 yards broadside. At this point the trophy hunter argument happened in my head.....do I wait for a bull with better horns, or shoot. I mulled it over for a second and decided to not look a gift horse in the mouth. Put the cross hairs of my 375 H&H behind his shoulder and boom, he was down! Probably the first time in my life I'd killed a moose before even getting the tent set up!
More to come!
I fly in around 2 AM and my buddy who I was staying with tells me to get some sleep because we've got to help his friend with his goat tag first thing when we wake up. I had a few days until we were going to get into the bush for my moose hunt so I had no problem with that. Next morning we wake up to bright blue skies and low 70s weather. We hiked in about 4 miles to find him already rafting out to the trail head with a goat in his raft. He had hiked in the day before, and set up camp. Woke up that morning and had a billy standing about 600 yards above him. He made a short stalk and boom, goat down! He couldn't raft farther so we split the load of his goat and hiked out 4 miles with heavy packs.
The next day we woke up sore and tired, but heard the silvers were really in down in Seward, and it's legal to snag them from the beach. We packed up rods and tackle and hit the road. When we got to Seward and started fishing, but we heard we should have been there yesterday (story of my life). Apparently people were limiting out in 7 casts, unfortunately that wasn't the case this day. I think out of the 5 of us who went, we only got 2 fish. Better than being skunked though.
I decided to hit the Parks highway the next day and see if there were any salmon left in some of my old favorite rivers up there. Low and behold there were still fish running in Montana creek. I caught several silvers, but most were too red to keep, but found a few that were good. Caught a few chum salmon as well, but in all my years in AK, I've yet to find a way to cook chums that makes them taste good, so those were all released. Ended up going home with 3 silvers that day. This was the last day I fished, it was a hunting trip from then on out.
We loaded up our gear, fueled the truck, and loaded our rangers on the trailer and headed North for the moose hunt. My buddy only had 4 days of vacation so we needed to get it done quick. He was also looking to get his daughter into hunting so we took her along, and at the last minute our friend in Healy asked if we could take his daughter because she wanted to go. I have no problem taking kids hunting so I said it was fine.
After about 300 miles of driving we arrived in the town of Healy. Our friend works in the mine there and was able to get us into the back side of the mine where there weren't a lot of people. We spend the night in his camp trailer and hit the trail at about 6 AM. About a half an hour before daylight. It took us about 30 min to get up to the spot were we wanted to camp. We pulled into the spot, shut off the rangers and started glassing but didn't see any moose. Kind of disappointed to not even see a cow in the area, but we had time. As we discussed how we were going to set up camp we heard an antler scrape off to our right! I rushed over with my binos and low and behold there were 4 bull moose standing in the trees with 3 cows! A quick look at them and I saw a bigger bull, a bull with a broken horn, a small paddle bull, and a spike.
I was kinda disappointed to see a bull in an area where he was reachable so early in the hunt. I like to hunt for the adventure, and shooting a bull an hour into the trip kinda bummed me out. As I thought about it, I was like, well am I here to hunt moose, or here to glass moose! The stalk was on at that point, I had about a 3/4 of a mile to get to the bulls, and some swampy country to cross to get to them. I hit the ATV trail and got about half the distance closed, then set in cross country. There was a draw between me and the spot I wanted to shoot from, but as I got over the small hill and started down the draw I discovered another cow moose standing there watching me. I had to back out before she spooked the other moose off. I backed out, and circled around her, but at this point I saw the group of bulls had walked a little ways down hill. I saw a ridge that was to their right. I figured if I could get up to that ridge, walk down to the area they were in I would have a pretty easy shot at them. I hustled my butt up to that ridge and climbed up. Once I got to the top I couldn't see the moose, I figured they had walked a little farther down hill, so I started to slowly walk in their direction. About a 1/4 mile down the ridge suddenly I saw a cow to my right, she was looking the other way, but still no bulls. I sat tight for a minute, the wind was in my face, and they didn't know I was there so I figured I'd wait it out and see what was going on. About a minute or two more of waiting and I spot the little paddle bull about 80 yards in the trees. I got up and started slowly making my way toward him. The bigger bull in the group had given me the slip, I think he saw me earlier and booked it out of there, but as I made my way towards that paddle bull I saw the spike, and then as I got around a tree, there was the broken horn bull 20 yards broadside. At this point the trophy hunter argument happened in my head.....do I wait for a bull with better horns, or shoot. I mulled it over for a second and decided to not look a gift horse in the mouth. Put the cross hairs of my 375 H&H behind his shoulder and boom, he was down! Probably the first time in my life I'd killed a moose before even getting the tent set up!
More to come!