Submitted By: Andrea Bassan
My father, Peter, had the only
license in our group this year, an either sex license for Area 36 – the Southern
Shore. Mike, Roger, my father and I have been hunting as a group for close to 10
years now and the arrangement normally works out well with fresh meat every
fall. This year, we were more or less operating on my father’s schedule and for
someone 80 years old, he’s quite busy.
Partridge hunting is one of his
many passions for which he spends most of the fall at our cabin in Trepassey.
This summer and fall he was busier than normal because he was also lending one
of his construction buddies a hand with a bridge construction supervising large
concrete pours. This meant his time for early season moose hunting was limited
compared to other years. We did have several day hunts from the opening day of
the season to Thanksgiving weekend, but with no success unfortunately.
At Dog Pond Barrens, a missed
opportunity on our first hunt and one well seasoned moose that managed to evade
us without a shot another day at daylight were our best opportunities. We have
since named this elusive moose Ghost. We have seen him and signs of him, several
times throughout the fall but he has managed to keep a few steps ahead of us on
every occasion. He’s a big bull and appears to be educated in how to stay away
from hunters.
Late season moose hunting can bring all kinds of weather and hunting conditions.
Warm and sunny to cold and snow. Our October 30th hunt in Trepassey started out
as a cold and crisp morning but warmed up nicely by 10 AM.
Our second setup of the day showed some moose activity from earlier in the
season but no moose were seen on this morning.
By noon, it was 20 degrees and getting too warm so we decided to get in an
afternoon partridge hunt.
One week later, we had an overnight snowstorm that brought 20 cm of snow to the
Avalon Peninsula. Pete Tucker joined us on this day for a moose hunt on the
Trepassey barrens. We knew it would be hard going in the snow but we decided to
try an area where my father saw a couple of moose earlier in the week while
partridge hunting. Rabbit tracks were the only sign of life seen.
For our afternoon hunt, we tried a few spots closer to the shore which had
received less snow than the higher elevations and open barren country. We did
find one set of tracks that looked fresh (from earlier that morning Pete
figured) but the moose were nowhere to be seen.
For the remainder of the season, Pete continued to hunt with us. We hunted the
Trepassey area and Dog Pond Barrens once or twice a week until the end of the
season. Late season moose hunting for us involves setting up early in the
morning at a prime spot and keeping an eye out for any moose that may be on the
move. If we don’t see any moose moving around we then go for a walk until we
find fresh tracks. Then the fun begins. If my iPhone health app is accurate, we
walked anywhere from 15 to 22 km on every hunt. We had some opportunities and
found fresh sign of moose, but nothing that resulted in a successful hunt.
Hunting Dog Pond Barrens is much different than hunting in our usual spots in
and around Trepassey. In Trepassey, there’s much more open country than forest
where at Dog Pond Barrens it's the reverse. Moose can easily hide in the thick
woods and aren’t too keen on coming out into the open. This was the case on one
mid-November hunt.
We had a moose come to edge of
the woods 4 times, each time stopping just inside the tree line and turning
around. Eventually, the moose did cross the pole line but well out of our sight.
It was as if the moose knew that his crossing spot wasn’t visible from our look
out. I call that one educated animal. Hunting conditions were generally good
during the remainder of the season, with everything from bright sunny skies to
cold, dull wintry days.
We did have one good opportunity at Dog Pond Barrens that did not end well, and
one that still bothers us today. Just after daylight on one late November
morning, we saw two moose grazing at the edge of the woods. The shot was made
and the moose went down after a few steps inside the woods. Success! Or we
thought anyways. We had a short walk to get to the moose but when we got there,
the moose was nowhere to be seen. We couldn’t believe it. We were sure a
successful shot was made – the moose went down and stayed down. So we thought
anyways. All that we found was an imprint of a moose and some tuffs of moose
hair.
All 3 of us knew what we had to do next – start looking for the moose. We found
a very light blood trail and did everything possible to find the animal. At
first the blood trail was easy to see on hard ground or on rocks, but it started
to dry up and quickly we were only finding a few drops here and there.
We had seen 2 moose that morning and we did find the two sets of tracks. We
followed both until we couldn’t track them anymore. When the blood trail
eventually dried up we were able to follow the animal’s tracks for another few
hundred metres into a couple of large cutovers. That track eventually
disappeared in the ground cover also.
By sunset we knew there was nothing else we could do. We determined that the
moose wasn’t fatally wounded. The fact that the blood trail stopped and tracks
continued was a good indication that this was the case. None of us were happy
about the day’s hunt but we knew we did everything that responsible hunters
should do in this situation. The drive home was a quiet one.
Not being inclined to quit while there was still time left in the season, we
continued to hunt through December. Christmas week also provided a couple of
good hunting opportunities which we took advantage of. Our last hunt was on
December 30th. Unfortunately, our season ended without my father filling his
license.
Oh well, that’s moose hunting. Hopefully our group has better luck in the 2022
season.
Cheers, BASSAN
