Moose wandering around on the home quarter of myself and my wife Joan just south of Dapp are a pretty rare sight, and to have one in the yard is even rarer.
When one turned up in our farm yard the Saturday morning of Jan. 29, the occasion called for a little photography.
The young bull moose was at the north end of the farmyard, where snow had been plowed out of the way, and stood quietly eyeing one of the two dogs on the property while getting his photo taken. Then, just as quietly, and in no real hurry, he ambled off back through the stand of trees to the north of the farmyard, following a trail that had been plowed out of the deep snow around the trees. The trail is where Joan usually takes a twice a day walk.
Later that morning, on her morning walk, she said the moose was standing back in the trees.
The two dogs generally go along with her, and are usually bounding down the trail ahead of her. She says she called them away when they spotted the animal and began barking.
She never gave the animal much more thought, but when she went for her afternoon walk, things became quite different very quickly.
The moose was back just north of the farm buildings and a little east of her trail, about 50 yards, enjoying himself feeding at a stack of hay bales. The dogs, as usual, had gone on ahead of her she recalls.
When she spotted the young bull, the need to go for an afternoon walk suddenly didn’t seem important, so she turned to head back to the house.
“Suddenly, he just came charging at me,” she said. “I screamed at him and started to run, but he just changed course and kept coming.”
The moose ran her down, knocking her face down on the trail. It all happened so quickly, she said she doesn’t really know what all exactly took place, but knew she had been trampled on before the animal decided to take off.
That was the last he has been seen on that farm, but our son Roy spotted him south of Highway 661 west of Dapp the next day, and a neighbour said he had seen the same moose earlier in the week along the highway as well.
For her part, Joan wound up with a large nasty bruise on the back of her left leg, just at knee height and another on her right forearm which soon swelled up somewhat and very sore. She also received a sore back where the moose obviously had stepped, but no bruising. She attributes the lack of real serious injury to the heavy winter coat she was wearing. An x-ray of the swollen arm revealed no broken bones.
Still, as she noted, it was a pretty scary thing. Even that young bull moose stands fairly tall.
Why did it happen and what can be done and what should be done?
Some suggested since the animal was on private property, someone should have just gone ahead and shot it. Regardless of that thought, the moose had retreated quickly anyway, so even if it was legal and allowed, there was no time.
There was also the Ralph Klein suggestion (the one he made in the days of BSE — shoot, shovel and shut up).
Most would be cautious of a cow moose with calf, or a bull in rutting season, but a lone young bull in the middle of winter long after rutting season?
After hearing what happened and asked why it did, Darcy Boucher, district fish and wildlife officer for Sustainable Resource Development in Athabasca didn’t really seem surprised.
“He was just protecting where he thinks he’s living at the moment,” he said.
“It’s a typical law of animal. Fight or flight. This time he fought, rather than flight, and then he did take flight, which is unfortunate (he didn’t do that in the first place).”
“That’s the thing with the winter we’re having this year,” he continued. “With this deep snow, they’re keeping to where things are kind of cleared — unfortunately where humans are, because it’s easier getting around. The energy they’re spending getting through the snow is a lot, so they’re taking up residences in all sorts of crazy places.”
He noted he had just recently taken an animal out of a person’s machine shed because it was dealing with the snow and deteriorating in health and where better where there’s no snow and a bit of warmth out of the wind.
“We do get lots of this happening, especially with the deep snow,” Boucher added. “We’ve had them in people’s pump houses, we’ve had them in people’s basements … again, they’re still a wild animal and they’re dangerous.”
Later, after seeing photos of the animal e-mailed to him, Boucher determined it was a healthy enough looking two-year-old bull moose.
He said the longer they hang around an area like that, the less they fear humans, and then they keep getting in tighter and tighter and then they have a breaking point where something like that does happen.
“Again people can get seriously, seriously hurt by these animals.”
On a similar note, a moose was apparently recently seen on the Pembina River bridge at Rossington west of Westlock.
With traffic coming from both ways, the moose went over the side, and wound up being killed by the impact on the river ice below.
Not surprised at that either, Boucher said, “We’ve had that happen on our Athabasca bridge here a few times.”
Regarding moose (and deer) killed along the highways, he said the animals are trying to find the easiest route with spending the least amount of energy in doing it, and a graded road is easy and that’s why there has been so many vehicle collisions in the last while too.
“They’re sticking to the roads, it’s easier travelling, they’re licking some salt and people are still driving as fast as they are towards them,”
He said the animals travelling these corridors that are graded or a snowmobile track or trails — that’s where they’re travelling, because travelling in this deep snow they’re just using so much energy.
Why are they coming into areas where they haven’t been seen that much in the past?
Boucher said there aren’t the predators and they’re adapting to the habitat in the open, settled areas. Mild winters have helped the numbers increase, he added, but winters like this with deeper snow and colder are a natural control.
But moose encounters like this aren’t that unusual, said Boucher, noting the last bad winter up in Grande Prairie there were a number of people that got trampled by moose, so the local story is not unusual to his ears.
On the other hand, this is the first he had heard this year, but said it does happen — three or four every year that people get trampled.
He said if an animal in question continues to be a problem, call the local fish and wildlife office.
What they will do is basically, just deterrent techniques — either rubber bullet, bean bag bullet, scaring devices, or move them on with trucks or snow machines.
“Again, we just try to get them out of that area and back where they’re supposed to be,” Boucher noted.
As a final note that you just can’t go out and shoot any wild animal out of season, whether it’s on your property or being a nuisance or whatever, Boucher reminded, “It’s illegal to take matters into your own hands,”
People with any concerns of a wild animal being a nuisance or injured in a highway accident or whatever, should call 1-800-642-3800 and report the concern, and leave any decisions to their department, he said.
