THE MOOSE; THE BEAST OF THE WOODLAND
The moose is the giant of all deer; and many hunters esteem it the
noblest of American game. Beyond question there are few trophies more
prized than the huge shovel horns of this strange dweller in the cold
northland forests.
I shot my first moose after making several fruitless hunting trips with
this special game in view. The season I finally succeeded it was only
after having hunted two or three weeks in vain, among the Bitter Root
Mountains, and the ranges lying southeast of them.
I began about the first of September by making a trial with my old
hunting friend Willis. We speedily found a country where there were
moose, but of the animals themselves we never caught a glimpse. We
tried to kill them by hunting in the same manner that we hunted elk;
that is, by choosing a place where there was sign, and going carefully
through it against or across the wind. However, this plan failed;
though at that very time we succeeded in killing elk in this way,
devoting one or two days to their pursuit. There were both elk and
moose in the country, but they were usually found in different kinds of
ground, though often close alongside one another. The former went in
herds, the cows, calves, and yearlings by themselves, and they roamed
through the higher and more open forests, well up toward timber line.
The moose, on the contrary, were found singly or in small parties
composed at the outside of a bull, a cow, and her young of two years;
for the moose is practically monogamous, in strong contrast to the
highly polygamous wapiti and caribou.
The moose did not seem to care much whether they lived among the
summits of the mountains or not, so long as they got the right kind of
country; for they were much more local in their distribution, and at
this season less given to wandering than their kin with round horns.
What they wished was a cool, swampy region of very dense growth; in the
main chains of the northern Rockies even the valleys are high enough
to be cold. Of course many of the moose lived on the wooded summits
of the lower ranges; and most of them came down lower in winter than
in summer, following about a fortnight after the elk; but if in a
large tract of woods the cover was dense and the ground marshy, though
it was in a valley no higher than the herds of the ranchmen grazed,
or perchance even in the immediate neighborhood of a small frontier
hamlet, then it might be chosen by some old bull who wished to lie in
seclusion till his horns were grown, or by some cow with a calf to
raise. Before settlers came to this high mountain region of western
Montana, a moose would often thus live in an isolated marshy tract
surrounded by open country. They grazed throughout the summer on marsh
plants, notably lily stems, and nibbled at the tops of the very tall
natural hay of the meadows. The legs of the beast are too long and the
neck too short to allow it to graze habitually on short grass; yet in
the early spring when greedy for the tender blades of young, green
marsh grass, the moose will often shuffle down on its knees to get at
them, and it will occasionally perform the same feat to get a mouthful
or two of snow in winter.
The moose which lived in isolated, exposed localities were speedily
killed or driven away after the incoming of settlers; and at the time
that we hunted we found no sign of them until we reached the region of
continuous forest. Here, in a fortnight’s hunting, we found as much
sign as we wished, and plenty of it fresh; but the animals themselves
we not only never saw, but we never so much as heard. Often after hours
of careful still-hunting or cautious tracking, we found the footprints
deep in the soft earth, showing where our quarry had winded or heard
us, and had noiselessly slipped away from the danger. It is astonishing
how quietly a moose can steal through the woods if it wishes: and it
has what is to the hunter a very provoking habit of making a half or
three-quarters circle before lying down, and then crouching with its
head so turned that it can surely perceive any pursuer who may follow
its trail. We tried every method to outwit the beasts. We attempted
to track them; we beat through likely spots; sometimes we merely “sat
on a log” and awaited events, by a drinking hole, meadow, mud wallow,
or other such place (a course of procedure which often works well in
still-hunting); but all in vain.
Our main difficulty lay in the character of the woods which the moose
haunted. They were choked and tangled to the last degree, consisting
of a mass of thick-growing conifers, with dead timber strewn in every
direction, and young growth filling the spaces between the trunks. We
could not see twenty yards ahead of us, and it was almost impossible
to walk without making a noise. Elk were occasionally found in these
same places; but usually they frequented more open timber, where the
hunting was beyond comparison easier. Perhaps more experienced hunters
would have killed their game; though in such cover the best tracker
and still-hunter alive can not always reckon on success with really
wary animals. But, be this as it may, we, at any rate, were completely
baffled, and I began to think that this moose-hunt, like all my former
ones, was doomed to end in failure.
However, a few days later I met a crabbed old trapper named Hank
Griffin, who was going after beaver in the mountains, and who told me
that if I would come with him he would show me moose. I jumped at the
chance, and he proved as good as his word; though for the first two
trials my ill-luck did not change.
At the time that it finally did change we had at last reached a place
where the moose were on favorable ground. A high, marshy valley
stretched for several miles between two rows of stony mountains, clad
with a forest of rather small fir-trees. This valley was covered with
reeds, alders, and rank grass, and studded with little willow-bordered
ponds and island-like clumps of spruce and graceful tamaracks.
Having surveyed the ground and found moose sign the preceding
afternoon, we were up betimes in the cool morning to begin our hunt.
Before sunrise we were posted on a rocky spur of the foothills, behind
a mask of evergreens; ourselves unseen we overlooked all the valley,
and we knew we could see any animal which might be either feeding away
from cover or on its journey homeward from its feeding ground to its
day-bed.
As it grew lighter we scanned the valley with increasing care and
eagerness. The sun rose behind us; and almost as soon as it was up
we made out some large beast moving among the dwarf willows beside
a little lake half a mile in our front. In a few minutes the thing
walked out where the bushes were thinner, and we saw that it was a
young bull moose browsing on the willow tops. He had evidently nearly
finished his breakfast, and he stood idly for some moments, now and
then lazily cropping a mouthful of twig tips. Then he walked off
with great strides in a straight line across the marsh, splashing
among the wet water-plants, and plowing through boggy spaces with the
indifference begotten of vast strength and legs longer than those of
any other animal on this continent. At times he entered beds of reeds
which hid him from view, though their surging and bending showed the
wake of his passage; at other times he walked through meadows of tall
grass, the withered yellow stalks rising to his flanks, while his body
loomed above them, glistening black and wet in the level sunbeams.
Once he stopped for a few moments on a rise of dry ground, seemingly
to enjoy the heat of the young sun; he stood motionless, save that his
ears were continually pricked, and his head sometimes slightly turned,
showing that even in this remote land he was on the alert. Once, with
a somewhat awkward motion, he reached his hind leg forward to scratch
his neck. Then he walked forward again into the marsh; where the water
was quite deep he broke into the long, stretching, springy trot, which
forms the characteristic gait of his kind, churning the marsh water
into foam. He held his head straight forward, the antlers resting on
his shoulders. After a while he reached a spruce island, through which
he walked to and fro; but evidently could find therein no resting-place
quite to his mind, for he soon left and went on to another. Here after
a little wandering he chose a point where there was some thick young
growth, which hid him from view when he lay down, though not when he
stood. After some turning he settled himself in his bed just as a steer
would.
He could not have chosen a spot better suited for us. He was nearly at
the edge of the morass, the open space between the spruce clump where
he was lying and the rocky foothills being comparatively dry and not
much over a couple of hundred yards broad; while some sixty yards from
it, and between it and the hills, was a little hummock, tufted with
firs, so as to afford us just the cover we needed. Keeping back from
the edge of the morass we were able to walk upright through the forest,
until we got the point where he was lying in a line with this little
hummock. We then dropped on our hands and knees, and crept over the
soft, wet sward, where there was nothing to make a noise. Wherever the
ground rose at all we crawled flat on our bellies. The air was still,
for it was a very calm morning.
At last we reached the hummock, and I got into position for a shot,
taking a final look at my faithful 45–90 Winchester to see that all
was in order. Peering cautiously through the shielding evergreens, I
at first could not make out where the moose was lying, until my eye
was caught by the motion of his big ears, as he occasionally flapped
them lazily forward. Even then I could not see his outline; but I knew
where he was, and having pushed my rifle forward on the moss, I snapped
a dry twig to make him rise. My veins were thrilling and my heart
beating with that eager, fierce excitement, known only to the hunter
of big game, and forming one of the keenest and strongest of the many
pleasures which with him go to make up “the wild joy of living.”
As the sound of the snapping twig smote his ears the moose rose nimbly
to his feet, with a lightness on which one would not have reckoned in
a beast so heavy of body. He stood broadside to me for a moment, his
ungainly head slightly turned, while his ears twitched and his nostrils
snuffed the air. Drawing a fine bead against his black hide, behind his
shoulder and two-thirds of his body’s depth below his shaggy withers, I
pressed the trigger. He neither flinched nor reeled, but started with
his regular ground-covering trot through the spruces; yet I knew he was
mine, for the light blood sprang from both of his nostrils, and he fell
dying on his side before he had gone thirty rods.
Later in the fall I was again hunting among the lofty ranges which
continue toward the southeast the chain of the Bitter Root, between
Idaho and Montana. There were but two of us, and we were traveling very
light, each having but one pack-pony and the saddle animal he bestrode.
We were high among the mountains, and followed no regular trail. Hence
our course was often one of extreme difficulty. Occasionally, we took
our animals through the forest near timber line, where the slopes were
not too steep; again we threaded our way through a line of glades, or
skirted the foothills, in an open, park country; and now and then we
had to cross stretches of tangled mountain forest, making but a few
miles a day, at the cost of incredible toil, and accomplishing even
this solely by virtue of the wonderful docility and sure-footedness
of the ponies, and of my companion’s skill with the axe and thorough
knowledge of the woodcraft.
Late one cold afternoon we came out in a high alpine valley in which
there was no sign of any man’s having ever been before us. Down its
middle ran a clear brook. On each side was a belt of thick spruce
forest, covering the lower flanks of the mountains. The trees came down
in points and isolated clumps to the brook, the banks of which were
thus bordered with open glades, rendering the traveling easy and rapid.
Soon after starting up this valley we entered a beaver meadow of
considerable size. It was covered with lush, rank grass, and the stream
wound through it rather sluggishly in long curves, which were fringed
by a thick growth of dwarfed willows. In one or two places it broadened
into small ponds, bearing a few lily-pads. This meadow had been all
tramped up by moose. Trails led hither and thither through the grass,
the willow twigs were cropped off, and the muddy banks of the little
black ponds were indented by hoof-marks. Evidently most of the lilies
had been plucked. The footprints were unmistakable; a moose’s foot is
longer and slimmer than a caribou’s, while on the other hand it is much
larger than an elk’s, and a longer oval in shape.
Most of the sign was old, this high alpine meadow, surrounded by snow
mountains, having clearly been a favorite resort for moose in the
summer; but some enormous, fresh tracks told that one or more old
bulls were still frequenting the place.
The light was already fading, and, of course, we did not wish to
camp where we were, because we would then certainly scare the moose.
Accordingly we pushed up the valley for another mile, through an open
forest, the ground being quite free from underbrush and dead timber,
and covered with a carpet of thick moss, in which the feet sank
noiselessly. Then we came to another beaver-meadow, which offered fine
feed for the ponies. On its edge we hastily pitched camp, just at dusk.
We tossed down the packs in a dry grove, close to the brook, and turned
the tired ponies loose in the meadow, hobbling the little mare that
carried the bell. The ground was smooth. We threw a cross-pole from one
to the other of two young spruces, which happened to stand handily, and
from it stretched and pegged out a piece of canvas, which we were using
as a shelter tent. Beneath this we spread our bedding, laying under it
the canvas sheets in which it had been wrapped. There was still bread
left over from yesterday’s baking, and in a few moments the kettle was
boiling and the frying-pan sizzling, while one of us skinned and cut
into suitable pieces two grouse we had knocked over on our march. For
fear of frightening the moose we built but a small fire, and went to
bed soon after supper, being both tired and cold. Fortunately, what
little breeze there was blew up the valley.
At dawn I was awake, and crawled out of my buffalo bag, shivering and
yawning. My companion still slumbered heavily. White frost covered
whatever had been left outside. The cold was sharp, and I hurriedly
slipped a pair of stout moccasins on my feet, drew on my gloves and
cap, and started through the ghostly woods for the meadow where we had
seen the moose sign. The tufts of grass were stiff with frost; black
ice skimmed the edges and quiet places of the little brook.
I walked slowly, it being difficult not to make a noise by cracking
sticks or brushing against trees, in the gloom; but the forest was so
open that it favored me. When I reached the edge of the beaver-meadow
it was light enough to shoot, though the front sight still glimmered
indistinctly. Streaks of cold red showed that the sun would soon rise.
Before leaving the shelter of the last spruces I halted to listen; and
almost immediately heard a curious splashing sound from the middle of
the meadow, where the brook broadened into small willow-bordered pools.
I knew at once that a moose was in one of these pools, wading about
and pulling up the water lilies by seizing their slippery stems in
his lips, plunging his head deep under water to do so. The moose love
to feed in this way in the hot months, when they spend all the time
they can in the water, feeding or lying down; nor do they altogether
abandon the habit even when the weather is so cold that icicles form in
their shaggy coats.
Crouching, I stole noiselessly along the edge of the willow-thicket.
The stream twisted through it from side to side in zigzags, so that
every few rods I got a glimpse down a lane of black water. In a minute
I heard a slight splashing near me; and on passing the next point of
bushes, I saw the shadowy outline of the moose’s hindquarters, standing
in a bend of the water. In a moment he walked onward, disappearing. I
ran forward a couple of rods, and then turned in among the willows,
to reach the brook where it again bent back toward me. The splashing
in the water, and the rustling of the moose’s body against the frozen
twigs, drowned the noise made by my moccasined feet.
I strode out on the bank at the lower end of a long, narrow pool of
water, dark and half frozen. In this pool, half way down and facing me,
but a score of yards off, stood the mighty marsh beast, strange and
uncouth in look as some monster surviving over from the Pliocene. His
vast bulk loomed black and vague in the dim gray dawn; his huge antlers
stood out sharply; columns of steam rose from his nostrils. For several
seconds he fronted me motionless; then he began to turn, slowly, and
as if he had a stiff neck. When quarter way round I fired into his
shoulder; whereat he reared and bounded on the bank with a great leap,
vanishing in the willows. Through these I heard him crash like a
whirlwind for a dozen rods; then down he fell, and when I reached the
spot he had ceased to struggle. The ball had gone through his heart.
When a moose is thus surprised at close quarters, it will often stand
at gaze for a moment or two, and then turn stiffly around until headed
in the right direction; once thus headed aright it starts off with
extraordinary speed.
The flesh of the moose is very good; though some deem it coarse. Old
hunters, who always like rich, greasy food, rank the moose’s nose with
a beaver’s tail, as the chief of backwood delicacies; personally I
never liked either. The hide of the moose, like the hide of the elk, is
of very poor quality, much inferior to ordinary buckskin; caribou hide
is the best of all, especially when used as webbing for snowshoes.
The moose is very fond of frequenting swampy woods throughout the
summer, and indeed late into the fall. These swampy woods are not
necessarily in the lower valleys, some being found very high among the
mountains. By preference it haunts those containing lakes, where it
can find the long lily-roots of which it is so fond, and where it can
escape the torment of the mosquitoes and deer-flies by lying completely
submerged save for its nostrils. It is a bold and good swimmer, readily
crossing lakes of large size; but it is of course easily slain if
discovered by canoe-men while in the water. It travels well through
bogs, but not as well as the caribou; and it will not venture on ice at
all if it can possibly avoid it.
After the rut begins the animals roam everywhere through the woods;
and where there are hardwood forests the winter-yard is usually made
among them, on high ground, away from the swamps. In the mountains the
deep snows drive the moose, like all other game, down to the lower
valleys, in hard winters. In the summer it occasionally climbs to the
very summits of the wooded ranges, to escape the flies; and it is said
that in certain places where wolves are plenty the cows retire to the
tops of the mountains to calve. More often, however, they select some
patch of very dense cover, in a swamp or by a lake, for this purpose.
Their ways of life of course vary with the nature of the country they
frequent. In the towering chains of the Rockies, clad in sombre and
unbroken evergreen forests, their habits, in regard to winter and
summer homes, and choice of places of seclusion for cows with young
calves and bulls growing their antlers, differ from those of their kind
which haunt the comparatively low, hilly, lake-studded country of Maine
and Nova Scotia, where the forests are of birch, beech, and maple,
mixed with pine, spruce, and hemlock.
The moose being usually monogamous is never found in great herds like
the wapiti and caribou. Occasionally a troop of fifteen or twenty
individuals may be seen, but this is rare; more often it is found
singly, in pairs, or in family parties, composed of a bull, a cow, and
two or more calves and yearlings. In yarding, two or more such families
may unite to spend the winter together in an unusually attractive
locality; and during the rut many bulls are sometimes found together,
perhaps following the trail of a cow in single file.
In the fall, winter, and early spring, and in certain places during
summer, the moose feeds principally by browsing, though always willing
to vary its diet by mosses, lichens, fungi, and ferns. In the Eastern
forests, with their abundance of hardwood, the birch, maple, and
moose-wood form its favorite food. In the Rocky Mountains, where the
forests are almost purely evergreen, it feeds on such willows, alders,
and aspens as it can find, and also, when pressed by necessity, on
balsam, fir, spruce, and very young pine. It peels the bark between its
hard palate and sharp lower teeth, to a height of seven or eight feet;
these “peelings” form conspicuous moose signs. It crops the juicy,
budding twigs and stem-tops to the same height; and if the tree is
too tall it “rides” it, that is, straddles the slender trunk with its
forelegs, pushing it over and walking up it until the desired branches
are within reach. No beast is more destructive to the young growth of
a forest than the moose. Where much persecuted it feeds in the late
evening, early morning, and by moonlight. Where rarely disturbed it
passes the day much as cattle do, alternately resting and feeding for
two or three hours at a time.
Young moose, when caught, are easily tamed, and are very playful,
delighting to gallop to and fro, kicking, striking, butting, and
occasionally making grotesque faces. As they grow old they are apt to
become dangerous, and even their play takes the form of a mock fight.
Some lumbermen I knew on the Aroostook, in Maine, once captured a young
moose, and put it in a pen of logs. A few days later they captured
another, somewhat smaller, and put it in the same pen, thinking the
first would be grateful at having a companion. But if it was it
dissembled its feelings, for it promptly fell on the unfortunate
newcomer and killed it before it could be rescued.
During the rut the bulls seek the cows far and wide, uttering
continually throughout the night a short, loud roar, which can be heard
at a distance of four or five miles; the cows now and then respond with
low, plaintive bellows. The bulls also thrash the tree trunks with
their horns, and paw big holes in soft ground; and when two rivals
come together at this season they fight with the most desperate fury.
It is chiefly in these battles with one another that the huge antlers
are used; in contending with other foes they strike terrible blows
with their fore hoofs and also sometimes lash out behind like a horse.
The bear occasionally makes a prey of the moose; the cougar is a more
dangerous enemy in the few districts where both animals are found at
all plentifully; but next to man its most dreaded foe is the big timber
wolf, that veritable scourge of all animals of the deer kind. Against
all of these the moose defends itself valiantly; a cow with a calf and
a rutting bull being especially dangerous opponents. In deep snows
through which the great deer flounders while its adversary runs lightly
on the crust, a single wolf may overcome and slaughter a big bull
moose; but with a fair chance no one or two wolves would be a match
for it. Desperate combats take place before a small pack of wolves
can master the shovel-horned quarry, unless it is taken at a hopeless
disadvantage; and in these battles the prowess of the moose is shown
by the fact that it is no unusual thing for it to kill one or more
of the ravenous throng; generally by a terrific blow of the foreleg,
smashing a wolf’s skull or breaking its back. I have known of several
instances of wolves being found dead, having perished in this manner.
Still, the battle usually ends the other way, the wolves being careful
to make the attack with the odds in their favor; and even a small pack
of the ferocious brutes will in a single winter often drive the moose
completely out of a given district. Both cougar and bear generally
reckon on taking the moose unawares, when they jump on it. In one case
that came to my knowledge a black bear was killed by a cow moose whose
calf he had attacked.
In the Northeast a favorite method of hunting the moose is by “calling”
the bulls in the rutting season, at dawn or nightfall; the caller
imitating their cries through a birch-bark trumpet. If the animals
are at all wary, this kind of sport can only be carried on in still
weather, as the approaching bull always tries to get the wind of the
caller. It is also sometimes slain by fire-hunting, from a canoe,
as the deer are killed in the Adirondacks. This, however, is but an
ignoble sport; and to kill the animal while it is swimming in a lake is
worse. However, there is sometimes a spice of excitement even in these
unworthy methods of the chase; for a truculent moose will do its best,
with hoofs and horns, to upset the boat.
The true way to kill the noble beast, however, is by fair
still-hunting. There is no grander sport than still-hunting the
moose, whether in the vast pine and birch forests of the Northeast,
or among the stupendous mountain masses of the Rockies. The moose has
wonderfully keen nose and ears, though its eyesight is not remarkable.
Most hunters assert that it is the wariest of all game, and the most
difficult to kill. I have never been quite satisfied that this was
so; it seems to me that the nature of the ground wherein it dwells
helps it even more than do its own sharp senses. It is true that I
made many trips in vain before killing my first moose; but then I had
to hunt through tangled timber, where I could scarcely move a step
without noise, and could never see thirty yards ahead. If moose were
found in open park-like forests like those where I first killed elk,
on the Bighorn Mountains, or among brushy coulies and bare hills,
like the Little Missouri Bad Lands, where I first killed blacktail
deer, I doubt whether they would prove especially difficult animals to
bag. My own experience is much too limited to allow me to speak with
any certainty on the point; but it is borne out by what more skilled
hunters have told me. In the Big Hole Basin, in southwest Montana,
moose were quite plentiful in the late ’seventies. Two or three of
the old settlers, whom I know as veteran hunters and trustworthy men,
have told me that in those times the moose were often found in very
accessible localities; and that when such was the case they were
quite as easily killed as elk. In fact, when run across by accident
they frequently showed a certain clumsy slowness of apprehension
which amounted to downright stupidity. One of the most successful
moose-hunters I know is Col. Cecil Clay, of the Department of Law, in
Washington; he it was who killed the moose composing the fine group
mounted by Mr. Hornaday, in the National Museum. Col. Clay lost his
right arm in the Civil War; but is an expert rifle shot nevertheless,
using a short, light forty-four calibre old style Winchester carbine.
With this weapon he has killed over a score of moose, by fair
still-hunting; and he tells me that on similar ground he considers it
if anything rather less easy to still-hunt and kill a whitetail deer
than it is to kill a moose.
My friend Col. James Jones killed two moose in a day in northwestern
Wyoming, not far from the Tetons; he was alone when he shot them and
did not find them especially wary. Ordinarily, moose are shot at fairly
close range; but another friend of mine, Mr. E. P. Rogers, once dropped
one with a single bullet, at a distance of nearly three hundred yards.
This happened by Bridget’s Lake, near Two-Ocean Pass.
The moose has a fast walk, and its ordinary gait when going at any
speed is a slashing trot. Its long legs give it a wonderful stride,
enabling it to clear down-timber and high obstacles of all sorts
without altering its pace. It also leaps well. If much pressed or
startled it breaks into an awkward gallop, which is quite fast for
a few hundred yards, but which speedily tires it out. After being
disturbed by the hunter a moose usually trots a long distance before
halting.
One thing which renders the chase of the moose particularly interesting
is the fact that there is in it on rare occasions a spice of peril.
Under certain circumstances it may be called dangerous quarry, being,
properly speaking, the only animal of the deer kind which ever fairly
deserves the title. In a hand to hand grapple an elk or caribou, or
even under exceptional circumstances a blacktail or a whitetail, may
show itself an ugly antagonist; and indeed a maddened elk may for a
moment take the offensive; but the moose is the only one of the tribe
with which this attitude is at all common. In bodily strength and
capacity to do harm it surpasses the elk; and in temper it is far more
savage and more apt to show fight when assailed by man; exactly as the
elk in these respects surpasses the common deer.
Two hunters with whom I was well acquainted once wintered between the
Wind River Mountains and the Three Tetons, many years ago, in the days
of the buffalo. They lived on game, killing it on snowshoes; for the
most part wapiti and deer, but also bison, and one moose, though they
saw others. The wapiti bulls kept their antlers two months longer than
the moose; nevertheless, when chased they rarely made an effort to
use them, while the hornless moose displayed far more pugnacity, and
also ran better through the deep snow. The winter was very severe, the
snows were heavy and the crusts hard; so that the hunters had little
trouble in overtaking their game, although--being old mountain-men, and
not hide hunters--they killed only what was needed. Of course in such
hunting they came very close to the harried game, usually after a chase
of from twenty minutes to three hours. They found that the ordinary
deer would scarcely charge under any circumstances; that among the
wapiti it was only now and then that individuals would turn upon their
pursuers--though they sometimes charged boldly; but that both the bison
and especially the moose, when worried and approached too near, would
often turn to bay and make charge after charge in the most resolute
manner, so that they had to be approached with some caution.
Under ordinary conditions, however, there is very little danger,
indeed, of a moose charging. A charge does not take place once in a
hundred times when the moose is killed by fair still-hunting; and
it is altogether exceptional for those who assail them from boats
or canoes to be put in jeopardy. Even a cow moose, with her calf,
will run if she has the chance; and a rutting bull will do the same.
Such a bull when wounded may walk slowly forward, grunting savagely,
stamping with his forefeet, and slashing the bushes with his antlers;
but, if his antagonist is any distance off, he rarely actually runs
at him. Yet there are now and then found moose prone to attack on
slight provocation; for these great deer differ as widely as men in
courage and ferocity. Occasionally a hunter is charged in the fall
when he has lured the game to him by calling, or when he has wounded
it after a stalk. In one well-authenticated instance which was brought
to my attention, a settler on the left bank of the St. John, in New
Brunswick, was tramped to death by a bull moose which he had called
to him and wounded. A New Yorker of my acquaintance, Dr. Merrill, was
charged under rather peculiar circumstances. He stalked and mortally
wounded a bull which promptly ran toward him. Between them was a gully
in which it disappeared. Immediately afterward, as he thought, it
reappeared on his side of the gully, and with a second shot he dropped
it. Walking forward, he found to his astonishment that with his second
bullet he had killed a cow moose; the bull lay dying in the gully, out
of which he had scared the cow by his last rush.
However, speaking broadly, the danger to the still-hunter engaged in
one of the legitimate methods of the chase is so small that it may be
disregarded; for he usually kills his game at some little distance,
while the moose, as a rule, only attacks if it has been greatly worried
and angered, and if its pursuer is close at hand. When a moose is
surprised and shot at by a hunter some way off, its one thought is
of flight. Hence, the hunters who are charged by moose are generally
those who follow them during the late winter and early spring, when
the animals have yarded and can be killed on snowshoes--by “crusting,”
as it is termed, a very destructive, and often a very unsportsmanlike
species of chase.
If the snowfall is very light, moose do not yard at all; but in a hard
winter they begin to make their yards in December. A “yard” is not,
as some people seem to suppose, a trampled-down space, with definite
boundaries; the term merely denotes the spot which a moose has chosen
for its winter home, choosing it because it contains plenty of browse
in the shape of young trees and saplings, and perhaps also because
it is sheltered to some extent from the fierce winds and heaviest
snowdrifts. The animal travels to and fro across this space in straight
lines and irregular circles after food, treading in its own footsteps,
where practicable. As the snow steadily deepens, these lines of
travel become beaten paths. There results finally a space half a mile
square--sometimes more, sometimes very much less, according to the lay
of the land, and the number of moose yarding together--where the deep
snow is seamed in every direction by a network of narrow paths along
which a moose can travel at speed, its back level with the snow round
about. Sometimes, when moose are very plentiful, many of these yards
lie so close together that the beasts can readily make their way from
one to another. When such is the case, the most expert snowshoer, under
the most favorable conditions, can not overtake them, for they can
then travel very fast through the paths, keeping their gait all day.
In the early decades of the present century, the first settlers in
Aroostook County, Maine, while moose-hunting in winter, were frequently
baffled in this manner.
When hunters approach an isolated yard the moose immediately leave it
and run off through the snow. If there is no crust, and if their long
legs can reach the ground, the snow itself impedes them but little,
because of their vast strength and endurance. Snowdrifts which render
an ordinary deer absolutely helpless, and bring even an elk to a
standstill, offer no impediment whatever to a moose. If, as happens
very rarely, the loose snow is of such depth that even the stilt-like
legs of the moose can not touch solid earth, it flounders and struggles
forward for a little time, and then sinks exhausted; for a caribou is
the only large animal which can travel under such conditions. If there
be a crust, even though the snow is not remarkably deep, the labor of
the moose is vastly increased, as it breaks through at every step,
cutting its legs and exhausting itself. A caribou, on the other hand,
will go across a crust as well as a man on snowshoes, and can never be
caught by the latter, save under altogether exceptional conditions of
snowfall and thaw.
“Crusting,” or following game on snowshoes, is, as the name implies,
almost always practiced after the middle of February, when thaws begin,
and the snow crusts on top. The conditions for success in crusting
moose and deer are very different. A crust through which a moose would
break at every stride may carry a running deer without mishap; while
the former animal would trot at ease through drifts in which the latter
would be caught as if in a quicksand.
Hunting moose on snow, therefore, may be, and very often is, mere
butchery; and because of this possibility or probability, and also
because of the fact that it is by far the most destructive kind of
hunting, and is carried on at a season when the bulls are hornless and
the cows heavy with calf, it is rigidly and properly forbidden wherever
there are good game-laws. Yet this kind of hunting may also be carried
on under circumstances which render it if not a legitimate, yet a most
exciting and manly sport, only to be followed by men of tried courage,
hardihood, and skill. This is not because it ever necessitates any
skill whatever in the use of the rifle, or any particular knowledge of
hunting-craft; but because under the conditions spoken of the hunter
must show great endurance and resolution, and must be an adept in the
use of snowshoes.
It all depends upon the depth of the snow and the state of the crust.
If when the snow is very deep there comes a thaw, and if it then
freezes hard, the moose are overtaken and killed with ease; for the
crust cuts their legs, they sink to their bellies at every plunge, and
speedily become so worn out that they can no longer keep ahead of any
man who is even moderately skilful in the use of snowshoes; though they
do not, as deer so often do, sink exhausted after going a few rods from
their yard. Under such circumstances a few hardy hunters or settlers,
who are perfectly reckless in slaughtering game, may readily kill all
the moose in a district. It is a kind of hunting which just suits
the ordinary settler, who is hardy and enduring, but knows little of
hunting-craft proper.
If the snow is less deep, or the crust not so heavy, the moose may
travel for scores of miles before it is overtaken; and this even
though the crust be strong enough to bear a man wearing snowshoes
without breaking. The chase then involves the most exhausting fatigue.
Moreover, it can be carried on only by those who are very skilful
in the use of snowshoes. These snowshoes are of two kinds. In the
Northeast, and in the most tangled forests of the Northwest, the webbed
snowshoes are used; on the bare mountain-sides, and in the open forests
of the Rockies, the long narrow wooden skees, or Norwegian snowskates,
are preferred, as upon them men can travel much faster, though they
are less handy in thick timber. Having donned his snowshoes and struck
the trail of a moose, the hunter may have to follow it three days
if the snow is of only ordinary depth, with a moderate crust. He
shuffles across the snow without halt while daylight lasts, and lies
down wherever he happens to be when night strikes him, probably with
a little frozen bread as his only food. The hunter thus goes through
inordinate labor, and suffers from exposure; not infrequently his
feet are terribly cut by the thongs of the snowshoes, and become sore
and swollen, causing great pain. When overtaken after such a severe
chase, the moose is usually so exhausted as to be unable to make any
resistance; in all likelihood it has run itself to a standstill.
Accordingly, the quality of the firearms makes but little difference
in this kind of hunting. Many of the most famous old moose-hunters of
Maine, in the long past days, before the Civil War, when moose were
plenty there, used what were known as “three dollar” guns; light,
single-barreled smooth-bores. One whom I knew used a flint-lock musket,
a relic of the War of 1812. Another in the course of an exhausting
three days’ chase lost the lock off his cheap, percussion-cap gun; and
when he overtook the moose he had to explode the cap by hammering it
with a stone.
It is in “crusting,” when the chase has lasted but a comparatively
short time, that moose most frequently show fight; for they are not
cast into a state of wild panic by a sudden and unlooked-for attack
by a man who is a long distance from them, but on the contrary, after
being worried and irritated, are approached very near by foes from whom
they have been fleeing for hours. Nevertheless, in the majority of
cases even crusted moose make not the slightest attempt at retaliation.
If the chase has been very long, or if the depth of the snow and
character of the crust are exceptionally disadvantageous to them, they
are so utterly done out, when overtaken, that they can not make a
struggle, and may even be killed with an axe. I know of at least five
men who have thus killed crusted moose with an axe; one in the Rocky
Mountains, one in Minnesota, three in Maine.
But in ordinary snow a man who should thus attempt to kill a moose
would merely jeopardize his own life; and it is not an uncommon thing
for chased moose, when closely approached by their pursuers, even when
the latter carry guns and are expert snowshoers, to charge them with
such ferocity as to put them in much peril. A brother of one of my
cow-hands, a man from Maine, was once nearly killed by a cow moose.
She had been in a yard with her last year’s calf when startled. After
two or three hours’ chase he overtook them. They were traveling in
single file, the cow breaking her path through the snow, while the calf
followed close behind, and in his nervousness sometimes literally ran
up on her. The man trotted close alongside; but, before he could fire,
the old cow spun round and charged him, her mane bristling and her
green eyes snapping with rage. It happened that just there the snow
became shallow, and the moose gained so rapidly that the man, to save
his life, sprang up a tree. As he did so the cow reared and struck at
him, one forefoot catching in his snowshoe and tearing it clear off,
giving his ankle a bad wrench. After watching him a minute or two she
turned and continued her flight; whereupon he climbed down the tree,
patched up his torn snowshoe and limped after the moose, which he
finally killed.
An old hunter named Purvis told me of an adventure of the kind, which
terminated fatally. He was hunting near the Cœur d’Alene Mountains
with a mining prospector named Pingree; both were originally from New
Hampshire. Late in November there came a heavy fall of snow, deep
enough to soon bring a deer to a standstill, although not so deep as
to hamper a moose’s movement. The men bound on their skees and started
to the borders of a lake, to kill some blacktail. In a thicket close
to the lake’s brink they suddenly came across a bull moose; a lean old
fellow, still savage from the rut. Pingree, who was nearest, fired at
and wounded him; whereupon he rushed straight at the man, knocked him
down before he could turn round on his skees, and began to pound him
with his terrible forefeet. Summoned by his comrade’s despairing cries,
Purvis rushed round the thickets, and shot the squealing, trampling
monster through the body, and immediately after had to swing himself up
a small tree to avoid its furious rush. The moose did not turn after
this charge, but kept straight on, and was not seen again. The wounded
man was past all help, for his chest was beaten in, and he died in a
couple of hours.