Woman treated for injuries after son fends off moose in Bienfait

A woman’s encounter with a moose outside her Bienfait home could have resulted in an outcome far worse than a short hospital stint if her son had not been there to help.

On the morning of Jan. 22, Shawn Tuffnell was making his lunch for work while his mom, Angie, walked out to start the car. He said she didn’t notice an underweight bull moose that had taken refuge from the cold and fallen asleep beside the home’s dryer vent on a day when temperatures dropped to around -48 C with the wind chill.

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Once she noticed the animal, he said she tried running away, but the startled moose ran after her.

Tuffnell said he heard his mom saying something and “could tell by the tone… that it wasn’t very good.”

At first he thought the noise was just her reaction to the frigid weather, but he said the sounds became “way scarier” as he got closer to the door.

“I opened the door, and then seven or eight feet from the door there was a three-year-old bull standing on top of her,” he said.

Tuffnell said he tried yelling at the moose, but when that didn’t get it to move, he punched the animal in its face. He said he armed himself with a shovel and hit the moose a few times, causing it to leave his mother and go after him instead.

It came at him so fast “that I fell back into the house,” Tuffnell said.

A struggle between him and the moose ensued, and Tuffnell said he was hit in the stomach multiple times and slammed into the door frame.

“I was screaming for my mom’s boyfriend to wake up and bring me a gun over and over again,” he said.

Once he had the gun, Tuffnell said he fired five shots trying to blind the moose “so that it couldn’t go after my mom.”

He said he fired 15 more times before the animal fell.

“Finally I got through to the brain and dropped it,” he said.

According to Tuffnell, after helping his mom get up off the pavement he “reloaded two or three more 10-shot clips” to make sure the moose wasn’t going to get up and hurt anyone else, “and put it out of its misery.”

All told, Tuffnell said from the time he began shooting until he finished it only took about 90 seconds, but he fired roughly 40 bullets.

“Wasn’t much suffering or anything worse than what we went through,” he said about the animal.

Injuries sustained during the encounter

Tuffnell walked away from the encounter with a bruise, and he said he suspects one of his ribs is either broken or cracked.

“It’s pretty damn painful,” he said.

As for Angie, her injuries included minor cuts from falling on the gravel, bruises on her ribs, forehead and ankle – where the moose stepped – as well as a three-inch cut on the inside of her right calf.

“We had to do, I think, eight internal stitches and then about 20 on the outside to stitch that up,” Tuffnell said, describing their trip to the hospital.

He said Angie is also dealing with the mental toll of the encounter.

“My mom’s pretty traumatized being chased down by the moose,” he said.

While conservation officers tested the moose and told Tuffnell it showed no signs of rabies, to err on the side of caution he said both he and his mom are planning to start a series of immunizations.

Why it happened

According to Tuffnell, the moose was “pretty skinny, so he was probably close to starving.”

He thinks the animal was trying to find a reprieve from the cold.

“We saw his tracks where he walked through the yard first, and there was no real good shelter the way the wind was blowing,” Tuffnell said.

He said the moose came up to the house, “and then it was just perfect. No wind right in that corner.”

Tuffnell said he thinks it was the combination of conditions, including being cold and hungry and seeking shelter from the elements, which led to the moose’s startled reaction.

“Everybody keeps saying that he must have been sick,” Tuffnell said.

“They’re just dangerous, period.”

In an emailed statement, the Saskatchewan Ministry of Community Safety corroborated Tuffnell’s account.

The ministry wrote that on Jan. 22, there was a moose encounter in Bienfait, “resulting in minor injuries to one individual.” The ministry said it happened after the person unintentionally startled the moose.

According to the ministry, conservation officers transported the moose to the Canadian Wildlife Cooperative in Saskatoon for a necropsy on Jan. 23.

The ministry did not confirm whether there would be any further investigation into the incident, but reminded the public that although most wildlife naturally move on, “moose are large and unpredictable, so it is important to keep your distance and call the authorities if you encounter one in an urban area.”

Bienfait is located in southeastern Saskatchewan, near the U.S. border.