The Moose

When photographing (or watching) wildlife in our National Parks, you are required to stay a minimum of 100 yards away from predatory mammals like bear and wolf, and a minimum of 25 yards away from slower moving creatures like bison, elk and moose.

The park rangers seem to have a pretty good handle on the former — where we found bear, we found rangers. Well, maybe we found bear BECAUSE of the rangers’ presence. It seemed we were always a little late for bear encounters and found rangers on the scene regulating the distance between the tourists and the bear. But when we encountered the slower moving creatures, the rangers were usually not around.

That said, while following this moose I THINK we stayed a minimum of 25 yards away.

We first encountered him off the main road and grabbed a few frames as he meandered his way under the bridge and into woods. It was a long day, so we were not intent on following this guy. We were content to make our way to dinner. But as luck would have it, our drive back to the condo took us by a clearing where this moose decided to do some serious grazing.

Most of the photo-tourists who joined us on this stop had their cameras trained down on him from roadside. I looked to my right and noticed a path down to the water’s edge with one guy sitting there — eye level to the moose. That guy motioned to me, pointing to a clear foot-path. Slowly and quietly, I scrambled down the embankment and grabbed a series of images. This one my favorite.