Too Many Hunters!

It's still moose hunting season here in Alaska. We are hunting in Unit 14. (I think). Anyway, yesterday we decided to take a ride out the highway in the afternoon to see what we could see. We mostly saw --- other hunters!

On the way up the hill we even saw a Trooper coming out. He stopped us to inform us that there had been an illegal moose kill up there and asked how long we have hunted in this area. As we spoke with him I could not help but get a very strong feeling that just because we hunt up there we were suspects! (Suspects again, I thought to myself.)

I was having trouble rolling my knee-boot tops down and my calfs were getting too hot so after I got that impression I said rather indignantly, "WE did not see that moose kill!" I pulled harder on my boot and rolled my eyes for effect.

That reminds me of Kevin's little ditty on his blog "Life in the Bay" --- "Where men are men and women roll their eyes!"

Anyway, the public servant Trooper looks around Doug at me and at my boots and continues to say that if we learn who was involved or hear anyone bragging about shooting this moose, to call and let them know at 892-FISH.

We continued on and were on the look out for this dead moose. It was probably a too small bull since whoever killed it took the time to cut off his antlers before, we think, becoming too nervous to salvage any of the meat. We never did see it on the way in. We smelled it but only saw it on the way out. We did see bear tracks in the area it was rotting.

The 4-wheeler trail is really bad now that so many hunters have been using it. It could be a lot worse if it was raining. After going through many atv-sucking bogs We found a very nice spot to stop at so we parked the bike then walked in a little further.

Beautiful countryside and so quiet! I totally enjoyed the time we had together sitting on damp moss, quietly visiting, batting a gazillion bugs and munching on pilot bread, chocolate candies, cheetos, peanuts, cheese, and drinking soda pop and water. (Happily, Doug knows what is important on hunting trips!)

After an hour or so we got up and went on a walk deeper into the trees. We saw lots of moosey places with moosey droppings and moosey beds, but no moose! Then we decided it would soon be getting dark and we should probably head back out.

On the trail back out we stopped one more time on top of a golden hill, to listen for what we could hear. We heard something!

Scritch, scritch, scratch... just right over there. Way over there in the distance we could heard moaning and grunting. Moose? We looked at each other with raised eyebrows. Other hunters? Yeah, other hunters, we nodded.

We sat there listening. Moan, scritch, grunt, scratch. That was the noisiest "moose" I have ever heard. ('Cept for the one moose that ran right past me up on Baldy.) After we listened for a while we decided Doug should do his own scritch, scratch on a tree. He found a hard piece of thin log then took it to a tree and dragged it a few times. We listened.

QUIET!

I think those hunters heard that. We better go home before we become targets!

If it stays dry today (it's overcast now) we want to go out again today. I'm thinking about buying one of those hunter orange hats!