E-town hunter bags 890-pound bull moose

[Sam]

LANCASTER COUNTY, Pa. - This past hunting season was a good one for Lancaster County hunters who applied for lottery hunts.I mean, John Shirk of Goodville won the first Pennsylvania bull elk tag of anyone in the county, and then he went up to Clinton County and shot the state record nontypical bull, which ranks as the seventh largest ever killed in North America.Then there was Elizabethtown resident Anthony Gladfelter.In just his second year of applying, Gladfelter won a highly-coveted moose tag for New Hampshire last June.And he used that tag in October to bag the largest bull killed in the Granite State last fall, and one of the largest ever taken there."I figured it would take me several years of applying to get drawn, but I was really surprised when I found out my name was drawn last summer," said Gladfelter, 48, who works as a project manager for the Pennsylvania Department of Revenue.Gladfelter's adventure began last spring when he applied for a moose tag in New Hampshire. Nearly 17,000 other hunters also applied for the state's 675 moose permits allocated for the 2006 season.

Gladfelter has been applying to Maine for a moose license since 1998, but has never drawn one. He only began applying to New Hampshire in 2005.While he was fishing in Canada last June, Gladfelter received an envelope at home informing him he'd drawn a New Hampshire, either-sex moose tag in the area with the most licenses, the biggest bulls and the best success rate among hunters. "It was a once-in-a-lifetime thing," he said. "I lucked out. "Gladfelter quickly began searching for an outfitter, ultimately settling on New Hampshire Guide Services in Wentworth Location, N.H."They seemed to take the most hunters and have the best success rate," he said.Gladfelter also selected longtime hunting buddy Dan Knepp of Mechanicsburg to be his subpermitee.In New Hampshire, any hunter who draws a moose permit can pick someone to hunt with. Either hunter can shoot the moose, but only one moose can be taken by the two hunters.
Although Gladfelter's permit was good for a moose of either sex, he said he had his heart set on a bull.On Oct. 24, the two men drove 12 hours north to Wentworth Location and met up with their guide, Dustin Parent.The following morning, all three headed out on a huge tract of forest owned by timber and paper companies.

Gladfelter said it was raining pretty hard that morning and the search for a moose took the men through swamps and bogs."We got pretty soaked out there," he said.
The hunting party relocated a few times when they failed to find any moose before arriving in late morning at a clearcut that was loaded with fresh moose sign.Soon, Parent pointed out the large rack of a bull and Gladfelter and Knepp began stalking it.The pair got to within 70 yards of the moose when Gladfelter fired a single shot from a .30-06 rifle his dad bought back in 1953.Within seconds, the bull was dead.
It turned out to have 10 points on its right antler and eight on its left. The rack measured 52 inches across, which is a beast for any moose shot outside Alaska or northwest Canada.

At the official state check station the following day, Gladfelter's bull was weighed at 890 pounds, making it the heaviest bull shot in the state for the season."I only hunted about three hours," Gladfelter said. "Talk about luck." After he returned from his hunt, Gladfelter sent me an e-mail describing the experience.

Here's how he ended the note:
I'm thankful to the state of New Hampshire for offering this opportunity; to our hard hunting and well-equipped guides from New Hampshire Guide Services headquartered at Mount Dustan Country Store; and thankful to God for letting me live in a country where a common Pennsylvania state worker can have such a wonderful wilderness experience.

Lancaster Online.com: Local Sports : E-town hunter bags 890-pound bull moose in N.H.