Moose Trapped in Well Rescued After Hours-Long Excavator Operation

An excavator came in handy when a bull moose got stuck in an old, abandoned well in Pembroke, Maine.

The moose barely fit in the well hole, which was camouflaged by overgrown vegetation in a forest. The property owner was unaware the well was on the property he had recently purchased. After hearing a strange noise, he discovered the moose in the well. He then alerted the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries & Wildlife.

The agency’s biologists and game wardens hatched a plan to rescue the stuck moose.

Maine Department of Inland Fisheries & Wildlife“Wildlife biologists responded to sedate the moose, then they teamed up with wardens to carefully extract the bull from his predicament using heavy straps and an excavator,” the agency reported in a Facebook post September 19.

“The whole process took several hours.”

Maine Department of Inland Fisheries & WildlifeA wildlife officer entered the well with the sedated moose to blindfold it and place the straps. The excavator then lifted the moose gently out of the well, placing it on solid ground. After the groggy moose gradually awoke, it ran off.

The agency reported the moose was “no worse for wear other than perhaps his bruised ego.”

Delaney Gardner posted this video on X of the rescue: