One of my most interesting moose encounters came while canoeing. My canoeing partner and I rounded the tip of a small island in the famed Quetico-Superior region, and there was a classic scene: a moose in deep water, feeding, with just its head and back above the surface and aquatic weeds and grasses draped over its antlers. A moose can swim, but not so fast we couldn’t out-paddle it – for a short distance anyway – so we moved closer to take photos. I was in the front of the canoe – the bow – so I was closest to the moose. We had a gentle breeze behind us, pushing us toward the moose, so I laid my paddle across the canoe from side to side, and grabbed my camera while my partner steadied us with his paddle.
At 30 yards the moose still seemed small, since from my angle only its head was visible. These were old-school film-camera days, so I looked down long enough to adjust my camera, and heard my canoe mate scream: “Backpaddle! Backpaddle!” Looking up, the moose was now huge and only knee deep in the water, and it was coming our way. Fast.
Dropping the camera and back-paddling furiously to deep water, we escaped. Barely. We never agreed if the moose had been feeding in a deep spot and simply took two steps onto a shoal before it charged us, or if for some bizarre reason it had been lying down feeding, but I never crowded another moose while canoeing.
As I went into the woods, I saw people running from those same woods, toward me, back toward their cars. That can only mean one thing: something great to photograph just around the bend in the trail, maybe 100 yards or so away. Moving as fast as I could, while carrying a camera and dodging people running in the opposite direction, I couldn’t help but notice those fleeing the scene looked unusually wide-eyed as they ran for their cars. This is what being a photojournalist is about: the adrenaline kicks in and you go hard at the action, instead of backing away from it.
As I approached the bend in the trail my nephew reappeared, sprinting at full stride and yelling something that loosely translated as “Aaaayyyyhhhh…go back…aaaayyyyhhhh.” He may, or may not, have added, “Moose, save yourself”; we disagree on that to this day. Camera at the ready, I rounded the bend, ready for a bear or a bison – and was met head on by a cow moose bearing down on me like the previously mentioned Secretariat. Oh hell!
Diving off a trail to avoid a moose is a mindless instinctive decision. Doing it while trying to cradle a $3,000 Zeiss lens attached to a $2,000 Contax camera body creates a pause. In that split second of pause I was nicked by the shoulder of a 600 to 700-pound moose traveling maybe 30 miles per hour. Even a glancing blow from a huge animal is like nothing you have ever felt, unless you have been in a car wreck. The hardest tackle or check you endured in football or hockey pales in comparison. Brute force momentum takes you where brute force momentum takes you; when I stopped rolling I still had camera and lens cradled to my chest, and was very fortunately under a huge log, maybe four feet in diameter and elevated three feet or so off the ground. The space gave me hiding room and limited the moose to angrily kicking the log, inches from my head, unable to get an angle where she could actually hit me.
Realizing the futility of the situation, she walked back down the trail toward a nearby river: the Madison, I think. I of course followed, and came upon an amazing, idyllic scene. On a small island, maybe 50 feet out in the river, stood the cow moose. To her right stood a bull moose. To her left stood a nearly identical bull moose. The serenity was such that I almost forgot to take a photo. When I pressed the shutter, the calm was shattered. The cow moose heard the click, spotted me immediately, and charged. As usual with moose, I ran for my life. I dove back under the log, trash-talked the moose as she angrily kicked the log so hard that bark fell on me, and waited for her to get bored. When she retreated back to the river, I again followed, took one photo, ran for my life. Repeat. Repeat. Then a park ranger showed up, asked if I was trying to get myself killed, and ushered me back to our vehicle.
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| I photographed this bull elk, with antlers still in velvet, in Alberta, Canada. This photo was taken from less than 20 feet with a normal lens on a 6x7 format film camera. The shorter lens reveals the arc of the antlers, instead of flattening them as with a telephoto lens. Obviously I have much better luck dealing with elk than with moose. |
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| White-tailed deer, like this young buck, with antlers still developing, is the member of the deer family most people are familiar with. My classification system for the deer family: whitetails generally run from me, elk basically ignore me, moose typically try to trample me. |
| Copyright © 2020 by Paul Clark |
Once more your story reminded me of an event in Northern Cali where I lived in Lake County. Tule elk a long time ago roamed the hills of California but had been hunted out. Well, they moved a hard of Tules into Lake County trying to repopulate the elk. I owned a liquor store in Clearlake Oaks and across the street was the fire station. When ever the volunteer fireman would return from fighting a fire, I'd take a case of beer over. (Good PR) This was how I found myself at the fire house the day the deer hunter pulled in with what he said was the biggest deer he had ever seen. He was looking for the game warden to tag it, which was the law at the time. One of the firemen went to call the warden who lived close by, as me and the others went to the back of the pickup to see this big deer. The man threw back the tarp and we all took about two steps back. I don't know who shouted it first or if it was a group shout, "My God, you idiot, you've shot a Tule Elk. As everybody was trying to explain to the man just what he had done the warden pulled up. In order to shorten this: the last time I saw the man he was in the back of a police car, his truck was towed and the warden had the Elk in the back of his truck. The man went to court a couple months later. He lost his truck, rifles, got a year in jail, plus $10,000 dollar fine. But it was the largest deer I had ever seen.
ReplyDeleteGOOD. Could not have happened to a more deserving soul.
DeleteGreat story, Ed. In the past few decades state wildlife departments have been restocking elk in Southwest Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee and other states where elk were hunted to regional extinction a century or so ago: same thing happens here, people shoot them thinking they are just REALLY big deer. One deer hunter shot two bull elk before figuring out what was going on.
DeleteOn the darker side, we have a similar problem with spring gobbler hunting. This is close range, shotgun only work, shooting at birds that the hunter has generally called in with a turkey call, yet almost every year hunters shoot other hunters by mistake. Years ago in Virginia a licensed guide shot a turkey hunter by accident; this spring in Tennessee an off-duty wildlife officer accidentally shot TWO hunters after he somehow mistook them for turkeys. It's the south, what can I say?
I grew up hunting but gave it up decades ago. Hunters blame anti-hunting groups for the decline in popularity of the "sport" but what really happened is many of us realized we were in the woods with idiots with guns, and we decided to stay home until hunting season was over.
Thanks Paul,
ReplyDeleteThis is great fun. You are a classic example of what the psych biologists call "Risk Tolerant", running toward danger instead of away. Without the likes of you, armies would always be in retreat and we'd still be in Africa, foraging nuts and running from lions. Washington and Lee were surely both risk tolerant, making them great leaders of men. Shielded from death by the hand of Providence. Providence has been on your side as well, or you wouldn't be here to write this. It's easy to see why the Greeks believed that great heros, like Odysseus, had the protection of the gods. Beyond logic, skill or luck.
I love "Some people confuse elk and moose". Not if you have ever seen one. Would be like confusing a Porsche and an old Land Rover.
I want to see the pictures of the moose in the creek and the cow with 2 bulls that you risked your life for. All the pictures are beautiful.
Neil
Neil, thank you for the comments. Believe me, I too would love to see the photos of the cow moose with 2 bulls again, but so far I have been unable to find them. I took them on slide film @ 30 years ago, and at this stage don't know if a stock image agency I used to market images through bought them, or if they are in a mislabeled box somewhere waiting to be rediscovered. Bookkeeping and inventory control have never been my strong suits...lol.
DeleteA clarification about risking my life: when that cow moose nicked me with her shoulder, she wasn't yet actively after me, she was simply chasing people fleeing up a trail. When she rounded the bend in the trail, I'm sure she was as surprised to see me--less than 10 feet away--as I was to see her. From her mood, I'm guessing the other tourists happened onto some sort of pre-rut activity, and I was the only person left for her to focus her hormone-fueled anger on. After recovering from the initial contact I never felt like I was risking my life: I had a 4-foot diameter log to hide under, doesn't get much safer than that.
As for risk tolerance, we all have our comfort zones. Ask me to give a speech in front of a group of more than 10 strangers, and I'm a basket case; put me in the field with animals that could kill me if they wished, and I'm (perhaps overly) confident that all will end well. Unless there are moose involved, then I know there will be trouble.
An aside about Africa: I've been to eight countries in Africa, and on one occasion I did indeed have to run from a lion (my fault for a very stupid decision), and I feel the world would be a better place if we all had to live on closer terms with nature and animals that could kill us. According to world actuarial tables, my six-year-old son would have a longer life expectancy several places in Africa than he does here, so a life where you occasionally cross paths with lions is apparently not as dangerous as we imagine.
Paul,
DeleteI am sorry you can't find those photos. That is a shame.
I am not a psychologist, but I think most of us would not run into the woods, when everyone else, including a big brave nephew, is running out in terror. If that's not "Risk Tolerance", I can't imagine what the term means. Most of us would turn around without a thought. That's the normal instinct. It was just dumb luck that log was there. Probably high risk tolerance is a professional requirement for wild animal photography, as it was for being a cavalry officer.
I am reading a biography of Stonewall Jackson. He was not only a brilliant strategist but willing to act when others would not. And he rode into the heat of the action. Made him a formidable opponent.
By the way, he was terrified of public speaking - even to his troops.
Neil
Neil,
DeleteRisk tolerance vs fatalism: I'm not a psychologist either, but I've sometimes wondered which is the driver of risk taking. Not the sort of fatalism that all things are predetermined, but the sort that says when you get into a situation you can't control, you just have to roll with it. Dying doing something exciting at least beats dying of boredom.
Stonewall Jackson: I've always thought that if the South actually wanted to attempt to win the American Civil War, rather than just delay losing it, they should have had Jackson in command--or maybe Nathan Bedford Forrest--rather than Robert E. Lee. In your reading, have you formed any opinion on that?
Hard to imagine Jackson being terrified of anything, much less public speaking. But on that, at least, I know how he felt.
Paul, I think the risk taking thing is hard wired. You have it and I don't. Not planned behavior but instinctive. You run into the woods after a moose, I don't.
DeleteJackson was a great strategist and field general, risk taker, from what I'm reading, but was so secretive and weird that it's hard to imagine him running the war. He never shared strategy with his commanders, which made them crazy. He was crackers.
Neil
I think a reading of the history will show that the South could not win the war as long as the North was willing to fight the war. The North had to stop fighting. The South had no interest in invading and owning Maine, Connecticut, New York, etc. They just wanted to have the North permit separation. The North on the other hand saw that it had to defeat and essentially occupy the South to kill the succession.
DeletePeople came from DC for a leisure lunch to watch the battle of Bull Run, which everyone was assured would be a quick Northern victory. It was not. But that reflected the conviction of the North that this was a mini-rebellion that would be quickly be put to rest. Four years later, after the North went though numerous generals as leaders, after huge defeats and losses, and after learning how to fight —— the North was just better able to invade and wear out the South.
Had Lincoln not been Lincoln, had internal divisions in the North not lessened, the South might have pulled it off.
Lee was a superb commander.
Not often recognized is that he was also willing to expend the manpower in addition to his tactical smarts. Running out of soldiers is a turning point he is able to delay by brilliant tactics and strategy for several years (although I don’t there is evidence he saw this early on; his approach was to win engagements to the point the North quit).
There is a point in a battle (don’t remember which) where the North forces attacks a wall uphill and so many yankee soldiers are killed that the bodies become a wall from which the next charge is setup by the North. Lee watches this, and he makes a remarkable comment, the substance of which is the realization that the North has finally reached the point where it is will to loose people on the scale necessary to win.
The problem for the South was it lacked the material resources to sustain a long war. The North had more material, more manufacturing, etc. Eventually the South enters a period where resources are so limited that even Lee’s soldiers, in as much pain as they were just marching, could not carry the day. Lee surrenders because he can see his units no longer able to survive against Northern forces that have finally reached a point in leadership, experience and resources where they can roll over the South.
Jackson, like others, were a body of subordinate commanders that were first rate, superior to their Northern counterparts, and with Lee able to pull off victory and after victory. Maybe Stonewall could have tired out the North. But I think no one could have pulled this off.
As long as the North was willing to expend the lives and resources to bring down the succession.
I agree completely with Chip’s analysis. The wonder is not that the North won but that it took so long for it to do. Had anyone other than George McClellan headed the Army of the Potomac at Antietam where the North outnumber Lee 2-1 and Lee had the Potomac River at his back, the Army of Northern Virginia would have been annihilated.
DeleteJim
Chip,
DeleteYou are right and both Lee and Jackson understood that. Twice Stonewall thought that with an Army of 50,000 he could capture Washington and win the war. The 2nd time was the day after Lee drove McClellan away from Richmond. McClellan could not have responded in time to stop him. Lee and Davis would not agree. I am reading "They Called Him Stonewall" by Burke Davis . Pretty good. You get an idea of what strange bird he was.
Neil
Oh good show, Motomynd! I tell people how big, fast and dangerous moose can be, but until you see one, as Neil says, most folks don't get it. They are like a giant horse with a bad attitude, and regularly kill more people than bears. One charged a guy on a chopper in downtown Anchorage, and when it went down the bike throttle stayed open so it was roaring, which is what had apparently pissed off the juggernaut in the first place. The guy lucked out- the moose went after the bike and stomped it to junk. This was a Harley Sportster, 1000 CC and no little rice-burner, completely crushed under those massive hooves. They're also bloody hard to photograph; as big as they are they move from cover to cover like pro guerillas. One went through our campsite at Eagle River, and every pic I took but one this enormous beast was behind a sign, a car, a camper, the bathrooms, some trees. This guy had fought off either a bear or wolves; he had big bite marks on his flanks that had healed. Obviously, the predators picked on the wrong moose that day.
ReplyDeleteRoger, thank you for the two great stories! It is hard to fathom being a predator that might be willing to take on a moose: if I was such, I would try very hard to convince myself that eating mice and rabbits was just fine.
ReplyDeleteIf you are willing, please tell us more about your camping at Eagle River. I camped there on my way to Denali, on an extended drive I did from Virginia to Alaska and back that took me all the way up the Dalton Highway to Deadhorse, Alaska. Not far from Eagle River, at Chugach State Park, I had a wonderful encounter with a sow grizzly and cubs that I relate in Part 3 of my moose chronicle.
Got an email from Morris about a side story about the subject, I'll toss it around and see what comes up. We would fly into Anchorage, pick up a camper, go up to Eagle and camp the first day to get over the jet lag, then proceed north towards Fairbanks and points north. Outside Fairbanks is Chena Hot Springs, a favorite spot. On the way out to Chena we saw a car parked on the side, and as you say it's usually because someone has spotted some wildlife. So we pull over and sure enough, there's a couple moose out in the water. Turns out the two guys had stopped to roll a joint and one of them got out and wanted to know what we were doing. I said "Watching the moose." He says "What moose?" They hadn't even seen them!
ReplyDeleteGreat discussion on the Civil War too. It has been pointed out that the Revolutionary war was in fact not a revolution but a civil war. As you say the South didn't want to occupy the North, they just wanted to secede from it. The Colonies didn't want to take over London and occupy Britain either; THAT is a revolution, when one side overturns the other. I agree that much of the North's advantage was their industrial capacity, and while they couldn't mach the South for crops like cotton they were nevertheless quite capable of feeding their armies. Robert E. Lee famously said "With my troops and the North's cannons, we could defeat anyone."
ReplyDelete