cow moose « The Jack Jessee Blog

This is what it looks like when caribou cross your path on the Dalton Highway (click on the first one and scroll to the right to see them full size):

And here are three moose next to the Welcome to Fairbanks sign on the Parks Highway, taken the day after the caribou but there was no snow in Fairbanks at that time (10 days ago). Jack says this is a bull and his harem. You can barely see the one on the other side of the bushes but Jack says he’s a young bull trying to build a harem. The moose on the right looks to me like a young moose, possibly a calf of the cow. All-about-moose.com says about this topic: “The taiga moose calf will stay within visible proximity whereas with tundra moose calves they will generally avoid the harems the bulls collect. Bulls will tolerate yearlings but for the most part calves avoid the harem group.” We didn’t even know there was a difference between taiga and tundra moose.

Jack and I had an amazing moose experience in Healy a few days ago. Otto Lake is moose haven. We saw at least 6 moose in a 24 hour period. Here is a photo story of a cow moose and her two babies, and her yearling that she is trying to shoo away. Be sure to click on the first one and scroll to the right to see how it all went down.

The cow moose on the right chased the smaller one, her yearling, away. He doesn’t look too scared but she charged at him several times.

Casually sipping water. The lake is very shallow.

Does he not look just terribly devastated here?!?!? It’s really a sad sight.

She came back several times.

She’s looking back at him but seemed also to be preoccupied.

She heads back the other way.

You can see how close she is to our camper!

And now we know why she was shooing the yearling away! She’s got two calves to take care of.

She keeps trying to scare him away.

One baby ventures out.

But rushes back to the shore.

Then both of them wade into the marshy grass to nibble.

Then they come back toward us, walking along the shore.

Looks like a kangaroo face to us.

What a cute little bugger.

Here comes Mom getting in my shot.

And they follow her.

Trying to keep up.

Before they walk down the hiking trail (aka game trail) Mom stops to nibble.

Looks like they want to nurse.

You can see how very skinny the mother is. It’s no doubt that she needs to constantly eat to keep up her ability to nurse and take care of her babies. Her yearling just doesn’t have a place in this family anymore.

They were very alert but not scared at all by us.

Sometimes it seems like they made the same general movements but it could be that the smaller one, on the left, is copying the larger and more assertive one.