In Colorado, a hunter can legally kill only one bull moose in a lifetime.

Durango native Jerry Becay, an archery hunter for the past 50 years, shot his bull moose in September 2000 in North Park near the town of Walden in northern Colorado.

Becay, now 64, began hunting in 1955 when he was 14. His first kill was a mule deer buck taken on Missionary Ridge using his paternal grandfather's Savage 30.06. "I almost deafened my dad," he said. "I had a good case of 'buck-fever' and the end of the rifle barrel was awful close to his head when I pulled the trigger."

Becay began archery hunting in the late 1950s, he said. He is a traditional bow hunter, and does not use any sights or any mechanical aids.

The bow he used to bag the bull moose was a Fred Bear Take Down bow that draws 67 pounds.

It was late afternoon and it had been raining really hard, Becay said. "I wasn't even going to hunt any more that day. On the way back to the truck, I looked down into this swamp where I'd seen a bull before and gave a cow call, just in case there was a bull in there. I figured I'd 'call' him in the morning and see if I could lure him out."

But through the rain, in the dim light, here he came. (An agitated bull moose can travel 35 miles per hour.) "I hear this crash and there's this big bull beatin' a bush with his horns."

"I gave another call and he focused on me. When he got to where he was about six yards from me, I shot him. I remember thinking,' 'Don't do this, there're no trees or anything if he comes at me.' But the arrow went right through him, a double lung shot. He ran about 70 yards away from me and fell over dead."

Becay said he used a Fred Bear Razor Head that was about 30 years old to kill the bull. He was able to recover the arrow the next morning.

It was almost dark, it was cold, and it was wet. "But I didn't feel a thing except the adrenaline rush," said Becay.

Fortunately, the bull was fairly close to the truck, about 300 yards away, recalls Becay. "I knew it was gonna be a long night," he said, so he wolfed down a quick meal of home-canned deer meat and noodles.

"I drove my truck over logs and through brush up to where the carcass lay and started guttin' and butcherin' him out. I was afraid bears would get him if I waited until morning." He figured the moose weighed about 800 pounds. Becay said he butchered all night. "The truck was covered with meat," he said.

At one point during the long, wet night, he smelled smoke. "It looked like the truck's engine was on fire," he said. He had left his truck running with the headlights on the carcass and brush under the vehicle too close to the catalytic converter had started smoldering.

"I put that out and kept butchering," he said.

In the morning, Becay drove down to the closest game warden's office at Hot Sulphur Springs.

"There was an older game warden and a young game warden there. The young one asked, 'Ya didn't leave any meat up there, did ya?' The older game warden, eyeing the blood-mud-and meat-covered truck, just rolled his eyes."

Becay then drove straight to the taxidermist, left the head for mounting, and then on to the meat packer.

(Gretta Becay is a local resident and freelance writer.)