A Year of Longbows in Alaska (Part 1 thru 4B)

[Steve H.]

Note: I addded more photos to the goat hunt segment on page 1.

[Tuttu]

Great story and awesome pictures.  What a cool place!  Those caribou are twice the size of the ones I chase around.  
Chuck

[Meathook]

Wow. Thats just a buncha bull!!!   I need to move to Alaska well and Iowa and Montana.......

[John Havard]

Steve,

I considered taking a management job with the Aleut Corporation a while back.  While the Board interviewed me for the job I asked a lot of questions.  Much of the discussion centered around Adak - not only how the Corp could make money with Adak but also the problems with unexploded ordnance AND those huge caribou bulls.  One of the Board members told me that the ADF&G had weighed one bull with a live weight of 750#!!!  

Adak is indeed a long way to go for boo, but to get the chance to take such a huge specimen is very special.  Thanks for sharing the story!

John

[LAR43]

WOW!
That's something most of us can only dream about. You guys are livin' it!
Two great reads, & beautiful pictures to boot!

Thanks for sharing!!

Larry

[yth-mnstr]

this is a delight...I mean I can hardly imagine this type of adventure, but this helps.  I need to move as well.

[the Ferret]

Steve I bet you really regret moving up there and missing all those Mojams  

[Huntrdfk]

Great story Steve, and great pics too. When is part #3 coming?


David

[Steve H.]

I figured I'd add Part 3 tomorrow.

[Timo]

Bens came a long way since that havie in Texas!

Dandy bulls all around Stevey!

Great pics!  

[Holm-Made]

Great stories, Steve.  Chad

[Steve H.]

Hey Chad,

The moose call Dale Torma (Where IS he, you know?) made for me comes up in the next part.

[NorthShoreLB]

Good storyes, great pictures, great thread all around.


      M

[el cazador]

Great stories!  Thanks for sharing.  I can't wait for tomorrow's installment.  Seems to be the Tradgang theme. I like it, it keeps me coming back for more!

[AkDan]

Steve,

Sorry I missed ya, tomorrow is my friday, woooohooo, only -25, about time to get out for predators.

[Steve H.]

PART 3:  TOK MOOSE HUNT


Benny and I packed up my truck and caught the Alaska Marine Highway ferry out of Juneau to Haines on about Sept 5 and had a phenomenally scenic drive thru NW British Columbia and the Yukon and on into Tok.  We met up with fellow "Gang-Twangers" John Schneider of Tok and the Wingnut/Jason/John Havard crew from TX/IL.





Benny and I were limited to 50# each of gear for this Super Cub fly-in Lake hunt and they weighed us to the pound so we were feverishly cutting gear down to the wire.
I was dropped off first and watched a cow moose munch aquatic plants in our lake while waiting for Benny to arrive.

The first day out I grunted an upper 40's inch bull (we were in an "any-bull" area so it was legal) but it hung up at about 35 yards.  He was about as nice of a bull as one could see of that size with nice palms that swept forward and distinctive, long points.  Benny and I traded off turns calling with the birch bark horn my friend Dale Torma from Minnesota had made for me a few years back.

We would call each morning and then still hunt for grouse on a hill behind camp on the way back in the morning and to a calling site in the evening and loose arrows, mostly my arrows.  Benny eventually brought down a plump Spruce Grouse which we cooked in an open fire stuffed with lingonberries (low-bush cranberries).  





I was on a mission to arrow a teal and had a couple close calls but no-go.  We also started finding snowshoe hares on our still hunts and we tag-teamed one for the pot.





We saw a few moose that would come to our lake and feed on the aquatic vegetation as it was a very shallow lake but only the one bull (three times) ever came in to our calls.  On the second to last day the same bull came into Benny's call and was about twelve feet away from me on the backside of a cluster of black spruce trees and in between the two of us.  We both came so close to getting a shot, or trampled, but that bull had a charmed life around us!

This hunt ended with not much hurrah.  As we awaited our plane we picked five, quart bags of lingonberries and I have them soaking in rum now which makes a tasty liquor.  We had an early morning drive back to Haines to catch the ferry and saw a hundred or so Dall sheep ewes and a mountain grizzly on the side of the road in the Yukon.

Two days later we mailed Benny back to dental school in Portland and I was back to work but instead of dreaming of the once-in-ten-lifetimes brown bear tag that I had drawn and my upcoming trip to Unimak Island, I was confronted with the harsh reality that my lady friend Donnie had just been diagnosed with the blood cancer, Multiple Myeloma.

[wolfhawaii]

Great hunting stories and well-told, Steve! My prayers for a healthy resolution for Donnie.

[Holm-Made]

Steve, sorry to here about Donnie.  Prayers sent.  Dale is a loner by nature.  Don't see or here much from him.  He lives in a pretty remote part of the state and goes about his business.  I should give him a call sometime.  Chad

[Meathook]

Thanks for the story.  I hope and will pray that all goes well for Donnie.  Can't wait for the next installment.

[Steve H.]

Thanks guys.

I think the next installment will be broken into two portions as their is a "natural" breaking spot.  My intention is to add Part 4A tomorrow early morning (or late night tonight) Alaska time.

I may also have a small, fifth section from Luke "The Ursus" and Woodruff and my longbow duck hunt.