One of my favourite parts of working at the shelter is going up to feed the moose and deer each evening. I never thought I would get to be so up close to wild moose and honestly i'm not even going to lie - it's pretty amazing.
I think a lot of people don't realise how big moose can be. Let me try and put it into perspective. The biggest moose I have dealt with is Bully he was rehabbed at the shelter in 2011, meaning he is now only 3 years old, he came back this winter (as many previous moose do) because we put out food to help them as it's so cold and food is so scarce. While we feed up on the hill there are many wild deer that also come to eat, these fully grown deer can walk underneath Bully with the fur on their back just lightly brushing the fur on his underside. Bully is big! He also has shovel antlers, very big shovel antlers, one of them actually fell off a few weeks ago and it seems we were having a spell of good luck as it fell off right by the feeding station meaning we were easily able to pick it up and it will be painted and maybe engraved with Bully's name and the date he lost the antler and put in the volunteer quarters.
Another moose I deal with frequently is Gilbert. He is another male who was rehabbed previously at the shelter, he is younger and slightly smaller than Bully. He also has these tiny little adorable mini shovels, seriously they are too cute! He was however quite aggressive. I have seen him rear up on his hind legs and kick at deer, other moose, even our quad a few too many times. I say was aggressive because we fixed this. I quickly developed what I like to call my 'stern voice' that I would use to basically shout at Gilbert when he would come running towards me. I would stick to my path, walk towards him with confidence shouting 'NO' and he quickly learnt to back off and have some respect, otherwise he would receive a smack to the nose. So essentially what i'm trying to say is don't get on my wrong side once i'm back in England! Dealing with angry moose was a common occurrence and i'm pretty good at scaring them away now.
The deer are also lovely to feed and spend time with. Many of the wild deer are understandably very skittish and try to keep their distance. There are however two shelter deer from previous years that don't mind saying hello. Bella and Ping, they both have little numbered ear tags so we can tell them apart. There is also another deer, that has a government issue ear tag, not a shelter one, but is the friendliest deer in the world it seems. She adores cuddles and usually just follows me around while I spread the food out until I give her some attention. Pretty cool for an evenings work i'd say!
