Michael Eichele
Well-Known Member
I went to our local archery range today with my wife and on the range pops out a cow moose feeding on the range. We stop shooting and watch her for a bit. A bit later another cow comes out and they start to rear up and fight. The smaller one walked twards us and fed. I put the bail between her and myself and slowly went out and retrieved my arrows. We were less than 5 yards apart! After watching them for a bit longer just feed, we were going back to our truck and I heard the unmistakable sound of moose horns crashing. I said to her, those are bulls fighting!! We hurried over to where we heard them and within seconds we saw them. One was about 55" with medium mass and the other was a 65" brute with heavy palms and rare matching back tines with a kicker on one of them. They pushed and shoved and knocked down trees. The one stumbled to the ground and the other gored him and pushed him into some brush and an embankment. The bull moaned during this. He finaly got up to his feet and ran away. During this, the bigger cow had come over to see the fight. The winner kept licking her *** and trying to mount her and she kept on playing coy! We watched this increadible activity for over 1/2 hour. After the big bull and cow dissapeared into a sea of brush, I found the other bull. He had wandered off about 70 yards and bedded down in a shallow pool of water huffing and puffing. There was blood on the big bulls horns as well as the smaller bulls ear and leg. His bloody ear was also very bent out of place. I walked to within 35 yards of this brute to see if his condition was bad enough to merit a call to ADF&G. After finding only a small amount of blood at the fight scene and seeing no blood on his trail I opted to leave him rest in his bed to regain his pride. He would look at me on occasion only to look away as if to say "my pride is hurt, leave me alone so I might wallow in my misery!" So off we went, wife in tears over the wounded bull. I told her it was no differant than 2 big men slugging it out on a hockey rink! With eyes black and noses bloddy, the looser will go lick his wounds (more pride than anything) and they will be back on the same rink soon slugging it out again!
What an AWESOME DAY!!!!!!!!
Please note: I do not encourage people to walk that close to moose especially when they are uptight. In this case I was fortunate enough to ALWAYS have an object to escape under or behind to prevent an attack. At one point the big bull chasing the cow saw me from 80-90 yards away and was walking twards me and when his head dissapeared, I was able to get behind a big outhouse and hide. He stopped, looked for me and after not finding me, he turned and went back to his cow.
What an AWESOME DAY!!!!!!!!
Please note: I do not encourage people to walk that close to moose especially when they are uptight. In this case I was fortunate enough to ALWAYS have an object to escape under or behind to prevent an attack. At one point the big bull chasing the cow saw me from 80-90 yards away and was walking twards me and when his head dissapeared, I was able to get behind a big outhouse and hide. He stopped, looked for me and after not finding me, he turned and went back to his cow.
