When a young bull moose wandered too close to Interstate 25 near Wheatland early Sunday, wildlife agents tranquilized it, raising the question of how to get the massive, comatose animal into a waiting horse trailer.
The answer was simple, effective and involved equipment many Wyomingites have in their garages – a tarp.
“We were able to rock his body and move a tarp under one side, and then roll him over on to the other side,” Wheatland Fire-Rescue Lt. Jeff Herb told Cowboy State Daily.
Then Wyoming Game and Fish personnel lined up around the tarp. Each grabbed a section of the edge, and heaved.
“There were probably eight or 10 of us,” Herb said.
Once it was loaded into the trailer, the wayward young moose was taken by Game and Fish to be set free in its new home in the Snowy Range west of Laramie.
Avoiding Road Kill
The moose showed up on the northern outskirts of Wheatland, “not even a quarter-mile from Interstate 25,” Herb said.
Nobody is sure where it came from, he added. The Snowy Range is nearly 100 miles west of Wheatland. The Laramie Range and miles of high plains lie between them.
The moose might have wandered out of the Laramie Range because it’s been so dry lately in those mountains, Herb said.
Regardless of where it came from, the moose wasn’t in a good spot.
“It was in an area where, unfortunately, we’ve had some deer get hit on the highway,” he said.
‘A Gentle Rinse’
Wheatland Fire-Rescue get all sorts of calls, but Herb said it was highly unusual to be called out to assist with a moose rescue.
Along with providing additional brawn to heave the young bull into the horse trailer, firefighters were called in to spray down the moose while it was tranquilized.
There was good reason for that, Herb noted.
“Game and Fish told us that when moose are tranquilized, they’re not really good at regulating their body heat,” he said.
And with the day already starting to warm, the moose could have easily gotten dangerously overheated.
“We just sprayed him down on his body and his belly area,” Herb said. “A gentle rinse."
Once in the trailer, the moose was given time to come back to his senses.
“Once he woke back up, he was not too pleased,” Herb said. “Once he hot back on his feet, the closed the gate on him and he got to go for a ride.” .
The Snowy Range is some of Wyoming’s best moose habitat, so Herb said he’s hopeful the young bull will lose his wanderlust and not be tempted to return to Wheatland.
Herb said he is grateful to have been part of the rescue operation. It was a welcome break from the negative or tragic incidents firefighters often see.
“It was a fun experience. We were all just trying to keep him out of traffic, and Game and Fish did a wonderful job of keeping him calm,” he said.
Moose Cause Road Trouble
It’s not unheard of for moose to wander close to highways, sometimes daring to cross them, Patrick Cross, the Butte District wildlife biologist for the Montana Department of Transportation, told Cowboy State Daily.
Moose are mostly solitary animals. And they aren’t outfitted with electronic tracking collars as frequently as other species, such as elk, Cross said.
That makes it difficult to predict when and where they might show up, he said.
So, preventing catastrophic collisions often boils down to taking preemptive steps where highways cut through moose habitat, he said.
“We’ll put up warning signs, fencing to direct wildlife away from the road, and in some instances wildlife crossing infrastructure,” Cross said.
Moose Get Wanderlust
Moose can sometimes end up in strange places, biologists previously told Cowboy State Daily.
Stan Harter, Lander Region wildlife biologist for Wyoming Game and Fish, said he’s seen moose in the so-called sagebrush sea in the Big Piney and Pinedale areas.
Moose also sometimes traverse vast sagebrush country in the Oregon Buttes area, between Lander and Farson, he added.
Nick DeCesare, a research biologist with Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks, participated in one of the few tracking collar studies of moose. He said sometimes they’ll go to such extremes as hiking up and over mountain ranges in search of new territory and food sources.
That explains why a moose trotted past baffled hikers at 13,000 feet, well above timberline, in the San Juan Mountains of southwestern Colorado in September 2025.
Mark Heinz can be reached at mark@cowboystatedaily.com.
