Dawson City resident Heinz Naef has to wait 60 days to see if the moose he shot Sept. 25 will be recorded as the largest in the world – at 75 1/4 inches across.

Naef said this morning in Whitehorse he hunts for meat, so if the antlers measure out to be a world record after the mandatory two months of drying, he'd like to see them displayed publicly.

"This would be good for the Yukon to have this in our possession again,” Naef said of the record currently held by a moose taken in Alaska, not far across the border where Naef shot his near the confluence of the Stewart and Yukon rivers.

Knock, knock.

That's all Naef heard when he let out his moose call, he told the Star.

His hunting buddies had heard the same thing the previous night, when they were cruising the river and calling.

"There was two knocks,” he said as he rapped his knuckles solidly on the table to emphasize the brief but distinct response to a moose call the night before.

The next morning, Naef was dropped off in the same area. He called.

Knock, knock, is all he heard.

Naef waited for a while. Then he began walking into the bush toward a slough he was familiar with, as he and his sons and other hunting buddies have been hunting the area for more than 20 years.

He stopped and called periodically. Nothing.

Naef was about 300 metres in the bush from the Yukon River, when he heard the bull respond.

It sounded like it was a large empty fuel drum.

The leaves were still on the trees, and the veteran hunter couldn't see the moose.

"I started walking toward the empty fuel drum, and I called, and I called.”

Naef said the moose began to talk back, and continued to talk while he moved toward Naef.

"I knew I had him, because at that point they are committed,” he said of the typical behaviour of a bull moose during rutting season.

Naef said it was a sight to see as he watched the bull approach, swinging his massive rack silently between the trees, not making a sound, except for the grunt with every step.

Armed with his old British .303 with open sights, the 26-year resident of Dawson fired twice into the vital organs, and then fired a third time to finish the kill at 11:30 in the morning.

The knock, knock Naef and his buddies had heard was the bull slamming his antlers against the tree to announce his presence to everybody – would-be mates and any bulls thinking about encroaching on his territory.

Naef said the moose wasn't unusually large, given the size of his rack, and was probably eight to 10 years old.

He estimates it weighed about 1,250 pounds or more.

The eight in the hunting party –Naef and his son Brian, two other father-and-son sets and another couple of guys – gutted and cut up the moose and were back in camp by 5 p.m.

The bull dropped 248 metres in the bush from the river. They measured the distance.

It's in the freezer now, and Naef will know Dec. 2 if his bull will take over the record as the largest in the world

Whitehorse resident Clint Walker, an official scorer with Boone and Crockett, explained this morning the mandatory 60-day period to allow for drying is meant to create a level playing field for all hunters.

There is some loss in size due to drying, so it would not be fair if some hunters scored their antlers the next day and others who were in the bush for an extended period couldn't score theirs for a month or more, he explained.

Walker said antlers are essentially scored using four measurements, though there are other technical considerations.

The four measurements include the overall width, which has been measured at 75 1/14 for Naef's bull.

The circumferences of the two main beams where the antlers attach to the head, the widest point of a single palm, and over length of a single palm, Walker explained.

He pointed out as drying occurs, the two palms tend to pull inwards.

Over an extended period, the 75-1/4 inch width of Naef's rack could shrink to 70 or 71 inches, he said.

Walker said Naef's antlers could be a new world record.

"It would be kind of neat for a Yukoner to have the largest moose ever taken,” he said.

Yukon outfitter Dan Reynolds established a world record last year for the largest Dall sheep taken with a bow and arrow, Walker said.

"If you ask me what am I going to do with it, my house is too small,” Naef said.

"If it happens to be the world record, then I would like to have it somewhere where a lot of people could see it.”