Longtime guide learns new trick with moose Bull shot, then runs into pond

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ASHLAND – In his 24 years as a guide, Dan LaPointe has figured out the answers to plenty of questions.

The Masardis man, who operates Beech-Nut Camps, knows how to put his sports onto game. He has figured out good places to hunt and the best ways to get that game out of the woods.

But on Monday, as the first week of the split-season moose hunt began in Maine, hunter Dwight Dorrell of Hadley, Mass., helped his guide learn the answer to a question he’d never had to ask before.

“Do moose float?”

The answer … in a bit.

First, you’ve got to know that Dorrell didn’t plan for things to end up the way they did.

Just after daybreak, when Dorrell eyed a bull that would – hours later – dress out at 868 pounds, the moose had all four hooves planted on terra firma.

Then things got interesting.

“I shot him, and he ran about 30 yards and dropped down into the water,” Dorrell said.

The water was Pratt Lake. And after checking out the situation, his seasoned guide decided that the simplest way to get the moose back to the truck would be by floating it across the 600-yard pond.

The first problem: LaPointe’s boat wasn’t what you’d call “readily accessible.”

“I had to drive all the way to Masardis,” LaPointe said with a chuckle.

An hour later, he returned, and after winching the moose up to the stern of the boat, LaPointe fired up the 5 horsepower motor and prepared for the crossing … and the answer to the second problem.

“We weren’t really sure if the moose was gonna float, because I’ve never floated a moose across a lake with a boat before,” LaPointe said. “There’s always a first for everything. I found out that moose will float. … and that’s the heaviest object I ever trolled with that boat.”

Dorrell didn’t plan on immediately heading back to Massachusetts.

“Just tell my wife I didn’t get [a moose] the first day,” Dorrell joked, pointing out that he planned to do some bear hunting and fishing. “I’ll tell her I got one on Friday. No, no. Just kidding.”

As LaPointe readily pointed out, Dorrell and his sub-permittee were already equipped with a boat. And before dropping the moose off with a meat-packing operation, Dorrell admitted he might give it a try.

Brothers Peter and Jeff Fogg of Holden had their second successful moose hunt in three seasons on Monday when Peter bagged an 826-pound bull. The moose’s antlers boasted a 41-inch spread when measured in Ashland around 2 p.m.

Jeff Fogg was actually the permit-holder, but Peter, the subpermittee, took the shot when his brother couldn’t get off a safe shot.

“We were sitting across a tote road from each other,” Peter Fogg said. “It came out on my side of the road and he didn’t have a shot, so he told me to go ahead and shoot it.”

Jeff Fogg, who served as the subpermittee for Peter two years ago, said he quickly made a deal with his brother.

“I told him the next time he gets a permit, I get the first shot,” Jeff Fogg said.

Recent warm weather and some steady early rain may have favored the moose on Monday, as tagging stations reported light activity on opening day. The first week of moose season stretches through Saturday, while another six-day season begins Oct. 7.

This week, about 750 hunters hold any-moose permits and can bag either cows or bulls in certain northern and Down East areas, said Richard Hoppe, a wildlife biologist for the Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife. Beginning in October, another 2,200 hunters will head into more varied areas. Of those, about 500 will have cow-only permits, Hoppe explained.

At Gateway Variety in Ashland, where Dorrell tagged his moose, only 14 animals had been registered by 1:30 p.m.

As of mid-day Monday, moose-tagging stations in Medway and Millinocket – well south of areas that are open for hunting – had yet to tag their first animal. Hunters also hadn’t visited the first-year tagging station at the Old Town Trading Post by late morning.

The Greenville tagging station, which is among the busier stations during the October session, is closed during the September season.

Hunters are instructed to tag their moose at the first station they come to when they head out of the woods. Some hunters take that advice more literally than others and head for venues that may be inconvenient, but are closer “as the crow flies” to their hunting zone. Others stop at tagging stations along their route home.

Hoppe said the rain may have deterred hunters, while the warm weather is keeping moose in cool areas like bogs.

He suggested hunters interested in bagging their moose may want to focus on trying to call in the bulls while working the fringes of swampy areas.

Hoppe said the two-week split-season moose hunt eliminates the congestion involved with a 3,000-hunter, one-week hunt, and also allows municipalities to have a say in the workings of the department.

“We bring all the partners in on [the two-week season],” Hoppe said, explaining that some areas, like Greenville, opted to not sponsor an early moose hunt because it could negatively impact tourism. “We don’t just look at the consumptive users. Viewing the moose is just as important as hunting. We are a wildlife agency, not a game agency any more.”