State biologists and game wardens pulled off an unusual feat this week when they rescued a young bull moose that got stuck in an old well in Pembroke.
When Steve Dunham, a regional wildlife biologist with the state Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife, got a call about a moose trapped in a well in Pembroke on Wednesday evening, he says he wasn't sure what to expect.
When he arrived on scene, he found a young bull moose he estimates to weigh around 500 pounds sloshing around in the bottom of an eight-foot-deep, hand-dug stone well that was hidden in dense vegetation on private property.
"We knew that we'd have to immobilize it to be able to remove it, because a bull moose in the rut is not an unformidable animal. And it's very powerful," Dunham said.
Using a syringe on a long pole, Dunham dosed the animal with a sedative, then climbed down into the well, which had a few feet of water in it.
With help from a crew above, he placed straps under the moose's body, and within an hour, an excavator had pulled it safely to the surface. Dunham said he then gave the moose an immobilization reversal drug, and off he ran.
The biologist recommends those hunting moose in the Pembroke area this season to pass on shooting the untagged young bull because there may still be chemicals in his body which renders his meat unsafe to eat.
