Two potential world-record Shiras moose hit the ground in Idaho this week. The bull tagged by Idaho hunter Shelly Sayer on Sunday could be a new world-record and is also likely the biggest ever taken by a woman.
“He was holding pretty tight in this timber so I hadn’t seen him,” Sayer tells Outdoor Life. “I knew he was big, but I didn’t know how big.”
The bull’s green-gross score is 212 inches, with a net score of 208 1/2 inches. Its antlers measured 55 inches wide. While it still must go through the mandatory 60-day drying period, there’s no arguing it’s a massive bull. The current Boone & Crockett world-record Shiras moose taken by any hunter measures 205 4/8 inches, and was taken in Wyoming in 1952. The biggest Shiras killed by a woman, according to B&C records, was an 188-inch 4/8 bull taken in 1976, also in Idaho.
When Sayer took her bull in for mandatory inspection by Idaho Fish and Game on Monday, everyone piled out of the office and into the parking lot to see it. The average moose sampled during inspections measure around 35 inches.
“It’s the whole package. The size. The quality. Lots of paddle. Good points. Everything you want in a moose rack,” IDFG southeast regional supervisor Dan Garren tells OL. “It didn’t look like it was from around here. It looked like something that came out of Alaska.”
On Sept. 1, a bowhunter from the same unit killed the potential new velvet archery world-record Shiras moose; you can read that story here.
A Once-in-a-Lifetime Hunt
Sayer had finally drawn her once-in-a-lifetime moose tag, which is a weapon-of-choice hunt. She opted for her rifle. (Sayer says she overdid it while practicing with her bow, and she had just returned from hunting wild sheep in British Columbia, so she felt too worn out to use a muzzleloader.)
The weather was mild in Sawtooth National Forest by midafternoon on Aug. 30, but there was nothing mild about the ruckus in thick cover 100 yards away. As guides with Deadline Outfitters pushed the brush from one end, a bull moose charged out the other end. Shelly Sayer aimed and squeezed the trigger. Nothing happened.
“When he came out, he was running. I had a short window to get him down or he was going to be gone,” she says. “I had a hundred yards and he was already fifty yards out when my gun misfired. It was a difficult shot and a difficult situation.”
With her guide’s help, she quickly remedied the misfire. White Lightning, as Sayer calls her rifle, has a history of misfires and is something Sayer knows is long overdue for resolving. She only had moments to get back on target, but she stayed calm.
This Could Be the New World-Record Shiras Moose
“My husband says I have ice in my veins and I’m like a machine,” Sayer says. “I know what I need to do. I don’t get emotional. I don’t get scared. I just go to work.”
Sayer squeezed the trigger again, and this time her rife fired. Her husband could hear her shooting. Doug Sayer suspected his wife wouldn’t be rattled by the misfire, but he couldn’t see if her aim was true. But she knew she’d found her mark, and so did he when, from a distance, he saw hands waving high in the air.
“He not only had big antlers, he had the biggest moose body I’ve ever been around,” Doug says. “I’ve taken a lot of large animals, but I’ve never held a world record before. Shelly is so humble and gracious, it just really moved me.”
Sayer’s moose, and other big game in southern Idaho, are benefitting from a mild winter. There was so little snow the year before that they still had green browse to eat in November. While tick load can increase in mild winters, so can body size. Moose lose mass in harsh winters. They didn’t have to lose much, if any, last winter. They entered antler-growing season without a deficit leading to the potential fall of the world-record that has stood for three-quarters of a century.
“This has always been a big unit,” Deadline Outfitters owner Hoby Gartner tells OL. “But obviously when a bull that big hasn’t happened for seventy-four years, something else happened.”
Gartner had tracked this particular bull for two years.
“They grow a brain when they strip their horns and he was just starting to strip his velvet,” Gartner says. “We know he goes somewhere else when he strips his velvet, and we didn’t want him to go.”
A Decade of Growth
Sayer, who was honored this year by the Wild Sheep Foundation with the Artemis Outstanding Woman Conservation Award, started hunting with Gartner in 2014. She killed a 414-inch non-typical elk (414 Boone and Crockett score) with a muzzleloader that year. Gartner’s son, Stone, was just two weeks old then; when Sayer shot the bull moose this year, Stone was with her.
“I call him my lucky charm,” she says. “He’s just really incredible. He can communicate with adults unlike any other child.”
A decade ago, when the now 12-year-old Stone was a toddler learning to walk, his dad started finding significant bull moose near his hometown of Filer, Idaho. Gartner documented as many moose as he could, shared his research with IDFG, and expanded his outfitting business. Sayer’s bull elk put the Idaho business on the map; her moose won’t hurt either. Beyond its possible world-record status, the moose amounts to 400 pounds of meat for the Sayer family.
Read Next: Bowhunter Tags Likely New Archery World-Record Shiras Moose in Idaho
“It was surprising and exciting too,” Garren says. “It means we’re managing for really healthy moose populations with good genetics to go along with that. To get a moose like that, you need both. [Our area] produces a lot of high-quality animals, but it’s rare to see one personally.”
Read the full article here
