Day 10
Woke up at 4:50, -2 degrees in the tent trailer. Seemed like we got out of camp earlier and earlier each day. We got to “Not-mint lake” at 6am and hiked down to the marsh in the dark with our headlamps. We called till 8:15, and left the area at 8:30. This morning was different. The temperature was colder, all of the marsh grass was frosted. I witnessed one of those little events in nature that only happens once a year. The little yellow leaves on the tall birch trees must have frozen over night. As soon as the sun came up and warmed the remaining ice holding them to the branches they began to fall. It seemed as if only a few minutes passed until the trees were bare and all of the leaves had floated down.

At 845 we began the hike down to mint lake, we were planning to cow call moose for a few hours, then walk the timbered areas around the lake until after lunch then we would continue to call. We followed the flagging tape that we had previously placed to get to the lake as quietly as possibly. On the walk down to the lake, we walked between some small grassy marshes, then through a forest, then through the willows that led up to the lake. Once we were walking through the willows, I called a couple soft bull calls through the moose mag as we walked to mask any sounds of us walking in (thanks again Srupp for the KC moose mags idea). It was 9am and just before we got to the blind we had previously setup we saw very fresh, large moose tracks on the trail, that were not there 2 days previous. It felt as if heart was beating out of my chest. The tracks were going the same direction we were, clockwise around mint lake. We were so exited to check the trail cam that the big moose had just walked in front of that Jarrad put his gear down and walked over to the cam 50' past our blind. I began to put my gear down and looked up across the lake. In the opposite corner of the lake was a bull moose! He was still walking clockwise along the marshy edge of the lake not far from a tree that we had hung tampons a day previous. I quietly called Jarrad and pointed to the moose as I set up my rifle on a solid rest. Jarrad crawled back to our minty blind and the moose was gone, hidden in the willows. We quickly discussed what our options were and if we should call. Until now, we had not used a cow call successfully, and hoped that the moose didn’t run away once he heard us (this has to be a common thought among first-time moose hunters). I let out a shorter, mellow cow call and then settled back in behind the rifle on its windfall rest. 10-15 seconds later, this massive Cariboo region moose struts his way out of the willows, he is now 100’ further to my right at just over 200 yards away. He slowed as he came into the open, looking for the source of the cow call. As he came to a stop, I counted to three and pulled the trigger. The shot was great, later we found the bullet had went through the center of his heart. The mature bull moose stumbled, and walked into the lake in front of him. The water was shallow, but the mud was soft and deep. He made it out to 50’ from shore until all we could see was half of one antler showing above the water. I am usually the first on scene to advise that its time for the safety eye-poke after an animal has fallen, but instead I exclaimed “There isn't an eye poke happening on this hunt”. We gathered our gear and headed around the lake to the far side. On our side of the lake the shore was flat, and grassy. Easy walking. On the opposite side of the lake there were only a few paces of grassy shore before the thick brush took over, with lots of small creeks snaking below the grass. Easy to step in and get wet/twist a knee. Once we got to where the moose had went into the lake. I cut my tag, and we took some photos (I am looking at the moose rack sticking out of the water in the pic below). We came up with a plan to get the moose out with our inflatable boat and a rope. Jarrad went back to the truck and drove it back to camp to get more gear, while I loaded come-a-longs, rope, rigging and waders onto my frame pack that was stored in the backseat of the truck.



I got back to the lake and tied a lasso (learned how to do this 2 days previous when we spent 13 hours sitting at mint lake and reading the knots book). I tested throwing the lasso but was not able to throw it far enough to reach the moose. So I moved all of our gear back to the flat grassy area on the side of the lake closest to our access trail. I met Jarrad back at the road, and loaded the boat floor and other gear into the frame pack. Jarrad carried the boat back to the lake. Once at the lake, I took a quick break while Jarrad set up the boat. We hopped in and Jarrad rowed us to the moose. Wow he was a beauty. At this time only one antler was above the water, everything else was below. I struggled to lift him up as Jarrad took some pics. I connected the rope to a sling wrapped around his antlers, and we made it back to shore. We had brought 600' of 1/2 marine rope just for this purpose, so we were able to stand on the far shore and pull the moose into the deeper water and then across the lake.



We walked around the lake to the opposite shore and pulled the moose to the center of the lake, towards where we wanted to process him. We then pulled him towards shore until he got stuck in the mud about 25’ off shore. We had rigged up a come-a-long to a tree a few hundred feet from shore, and used a prusik to attach to the rope. 1/4 inch at a time, we pulled him towards shore. While one of us worked the come-a-long, the other had a strap attached to the antlers and was pulling and wiggling to keep the moose moving.

3.5 hours after the shot, the moose was on dry, solid ground on the edge of the lake. The sun was warm, but there was a cool breeze coming off the water. We had placed a clean white tarp in the shade, a hundred meters away to keep all the meat cool and out of the sun as we cut it off



I made the first cut with my havalon, just behind the middle of the belly, and around to the ground on the front and back. I then carefully cut the hide up the center of the spine while Jarrad began skinning the front quarter from where I had started the cuts. We detached as much hide as possible until it was draped over the antlers, so we could begin removing the front quarter. We had quartered out a large animal once before, an elk on our Tuchodi Riverjet trip a few years ago. It took a few minutes for us to find our groove, but the first quarter came off and was carried over to the tarp in the shade. One of us continued skinning the rear of the moose, while the other started the cut through the top of the neck meat at the base of the skull. The rear quarter came off next, and damn was it heavy. We kept double checking that the penis and nuts were still attached to the carcass, we couldn't tell which quarter it was going to be attached to when we were all said and done, but we sure as hell did not want to chop it off by mistake and have to hand a baggie with moose junk to the CO if stopped. I removed the accessible backstrap, and we cut as much neck meat free from the carcass as possible.

The next step was to roll the moose over so we could begin working on the other side. We had laid a clean tarp down, so once rolled, the skinned side down would be on a tarp instead of the dirt. It took all the strength we had to roll that moose over to the other side, it was one of those "I'm pushing so hard I sure hope I don't shit my pants" kind of moments. We then repeated the quarter, backstrap, and neck meat process.

We slit up the stomach and pulled the organs and intestines out, everything came out very cleanly, the blood did not start pouring out until the diaphragm was removed. We were astounded by the sheer mass of the 'blood pudding' that we removed in large pieces. For anyone that has not worked on processing a moose - they are large animals - no joke. When the heart came out, we noticed that this was the cause of all the clotted blood. The bullet had entered the center of the heart, and excited the other side.