Steve
Hall: Be Grateful You're Not a Moose, Adirondack Almanack |
"Every creature is better alive than
dead,
men and moose and pine trees, and he who understands this, and he who understands it aright, will rather preserve its life than destroy it." Henry David Thoreau |
Quick….
which animal is most
dangerous to humans in the United States? Ask State Farm, and they’ll
tell you
it’s the white-tailed deer, with about 150 people killed every year in
auto
accidents involving deer. Most lists cite mosquitoes (think West Nile),
followed by bees (allergic reactions to stings), and brown recluse or
black
widow spiders. Domestic dogs kill about 30 people a year, horses and
farm bulls
about 20 each, while rattlesnakes and other venomous snakes (usually
captive,
handled snakes) kill about ten. If you mentioned bears, wolves or
sharks, they
don’t even make the list, though they always make a huge splash in the
news. Outside
National Parks, bears tend
to run from people, while wolves almost always flee, regardless of
where you
see them. Then there are moose. If moose don’t hear or smell your
approach, they’re
more likely to stand there, taking you in with that impassive gaze,
assuming
they acknowledge your presence at all. Seemingly
fearless, moose should be the
thumbnail next to the entry "confidence" in the on-line dictionary. If
their ears stay up, and they continue chewing, start snapping photos,
but if
their ears flatten and they stare at you directly, consider how to back
away
slowly, speaking in gently reassuring tones, while taking peripheral
inventory
of any large trees, shrubs or rocks, in case you suddenly require a
shield. Moose
are far more likely to attack
people than are bears. We have stereotyped Bullwinkle as large,
bumbling, goofy
and friendly. Don’t expect to see any Hollywood movies titled “Raging
Moose
Massacre”, or “the Monster of the Ausable Valley”. What moose are is
incredibly
interesting mammals, who face a bewilderingly complex mixture of
hardships and
challenges. Moose are tragicomic characters in Nature’s dance of life. What
are
Moose and where did they come from? Today's
version of the North
American moose, alces alces, the largest member of the deer family,
crossed the
Bering Strait land bridge into North America about 10 to 15,000 years
ago, a
barely noticeable blink in the timeline of life on Earth, and at about
the same
time that hunter-gatherer, Native American ancestors were coming across
with
their wolf-dog hunting companions. Evolution
itself is a blind
architect, fated to perform modification only, never having that
creator’s
advantage of starting from scratch, with a blueprint not predestined by
an
existing structure. Moose speak to the imperfections of a process in
which
animals evolve in one ecosystem, and then expand into adjoining
ecosystems
presenting challenges for which they did not evolve, and are not
prepared. Moose
are enormous, herbivorous
ungulates, with large males and females weighing in at about 1,500 and
800 lbs.
respectively. In taxonomy, the lumpers seem to be getting the upper
hand on the
splitters these days: Bergmann’s rule describes how individuals within
a
species are somewhat larger on average in colder, more northerly
latitudes than
in milder climates, because natural selection favors animals with a
larger body
mass to body surface area ratio, as they are more effective at
retaining heat,
and therefore more likely to survive Winter’s hardship, when the
gauntness of starvation,
is joined by hypothermia. Generally speaking, Alaskan moose are larger
than New
England and Eastern Canadian moose, which are in turn larger than moose
found
in the Yellowstone region. Moose
in the northeast are darker in
color. Cows have brownish noses, bulls black. Western moose spend more
time out
in the sun, and have a brownish saddle for reflecting sunlight. A
Moose’s Life
is one Endless Quest for Food There’s
much to recommend the vegan
diet, but one shortcoming for herbivores in the wild, is the relative
lack of nutrition
in their diet. As a result, moose have to make up in quantity what they
lack in
quality. Adult moose consume about five tons of vegetation per year.
Try to picture
how much food this is: when you drive down the Northway, and see those
huge
cylindrical bales of hay in the farmer’s field, each of those weighs
about
1,000 pounds. Imagine eating ten of those, or on average 30 to 40 lbs.
a day! The
moose diet ranges from balsam
fir, white and jack pine, and the stems and bark of deciduous trees and
shrubs
in winter, to the leaves and stems of willow, aspen and birch, as well
as
aquatic plants in summer. Winters are more challenging, and moose are
lucky
just to eat enough volume to make it through to spring. Like trees,
moose don’t
really grow in winter, making up for it in summer, when they become
eating
machines, right up until the rut begins in September. In
summer, moose spend about eight
hours a day chomping on fresh vegetation, and another 8 hours
ruminating, chewing
again food brought up from the fore stomach, or rumen, one of four
different
chambers in the moose's stomach. Aquatic plants fill the sodium
deficiency in
moose diets, which is why we sometimes see them road side in winter,
licking
the rock salt we use to melt winter ice, and coming through the
windshield of
unwary drivers. The lips of moose are prehensile, and their nose
configured in
a manner that allows them to swallow while underwater, a process not
fully
understood yet, but a great advantage to an underwater browser. Moose
spend so much time eating,
they’re not great wanderers, and a moose who lives to the ripe old age
of
fifteen or twenty, may not be more than fifty miles from where they
were born. The
fates of moose and browse targets are inexorably intertwined. Forests
thrive in
areas which suffer wild fire about every 50 to 100 years. Moose thrive
in areas
of fresh burns, which can lead to willow, aspen and conifer eruptions,
as well
as in areas browsed out and long abandoned, allowing vegetation
recovery. Where
moose populations are water or
land locked, in other words, where habitats are not connected by
natural
corridors enabling the flow of wildlife from one habitat to another,
not to
mention a healthy exchange between gene pools, a growing moose
population may
cause its own correction by over-browsing, causing a collapse in the
abundance
of browse, followed by a collapse in the now starving moose population,
whose
increasing mortality rate makes the wolf’s efforts at survival much
easier and
less dangerous, as they can avoid the dangers of the hunt by scavenging
dead
moose, leading to an uptick in the pack’s numbers, and so on, as the
circle of
life rumbles on. The
scarcer browse becomes for
moose, the more likely they are to stand their ground at a feeding
location,
when confronted by people or wolves. Since moose weigh in at anywhere
from ten
to fifteen times the size of the average gray wolf, and defend
themselves very
well with powerful kicks delivered with sharp front and rear hooves,
wolf packs
carefully test moose for vulnerability with the result that, on
average, wolves
actually choose to attack only one in every twenty moose they approach.
Healthy
moose between the ages of about two and ten are relatively safe from
wolf
attacks, as the challenge they present to attacking wolves is not worth
the
risk. Mammal
hides generally, and moose
hides in particular, are very efficient at retaining heat, even during
the
coldest winters. After shedding their
winter coats, moose consider fifty degrees the optimal temperature.
Being in
the lake or bog gives them relief from the heat and biting insects, and
because
they can stand comfortably at depths where wolves would be at a
disadvantage in
any attack. Moose
Romance
and Mating Moose
are solitary creatures, and
don’t generally herd up the way elk and caribou do. During most of the
year, bulls
tend to live alone, and in an almost comical rebuke to Intelligent
Design, spend
25% of their annual energy input growing those absurdly massive
antlers, which
may top out at 50 pounds. Antler growth begins in the Spring, and the
bulls use
them during the brief rut season in Autumn, not only to contest mating
rights
with other bulls, but as display evidence for cows, sort of the moose
equivalent
of showing off a flashy car or mansion, a clear indication of their
strength
and suitability as progenitors for healthy calves. Moose
courtship is, well… earthy. Bulls
sport a fleshy appendage under the jaw called the rope and bell, the
size of
the bell being one sign of maturity, while females have only the rope.
The rope
and bell may freeze and drop off in a very cold winter. Ouch! The
purpose of
the bell seems to be to excite females during the rut. Bulls churn up
the soil
with their front hooves, urinate in the resulting pile, vigorously mix
it again
with their front hooves, and then splash it with their hooves, as
though stepping
through a spray of perfume, before rolling the bell back and forth
through the
muck for a final dose. Cows will push and shove each other for the
right to
roll in this cologne, while the bulls display upwind, tilting their
heads to
show off the size and breadth of their antlers, and shaking their
bells,
wafting that fragrance to the aroused cows. The
size of a bull’s rack is not
only an indication of overall health, and the ability to locate and
exploit
superior browse, it’s a sign of maturity. Dominant bulls will end up
mating
with multiple cows, while younger bulls practice harmless antler
sparring with accommodating
older bulls with larger racks. Mature bulls tend to be seriously
challenged
only by bulls of comparable size, and serious combat, involving antler
punctured torsos and injured limbs may result. Many bulls become so
exhausted
by the rut, they fall prey to wolves, who quickly recognize weakness,
injury and
vulnerability. Bulls
may cluster before the rut for
playful, tune-up sparring, and after the rut, when their condition,
weakened by
fasting and violent encounters with other bulls, not to mention the
seasonal
shedding of their antlers, may provide safety in numbers. Cows are
naturally
very protective of their calves, and will drive away predators and
other moose,
the latter in response to defending food sources. Ask any wolf who’s
had his
skull caved in by Mama Moose’s sharp and heavy hooves, when they got
too
aggressive with her calf. Like all ungulate calves, moose need
protection as
they’re only about 30 lbs. when born in May, bulking up to about 300
lbs.
within six months to be prepared for the hardships of winter. One
interesting aspect about moose
calves, as well as the young of other ungulates, like deer and elk, is
the fact
that they are nearly odor free, thanks to natural selection. The calves
with
more odor get discovered and eaten, those with less grow up to breed,
and pass
along the “less stinky” gene, so that after thousands of generations of
this
tendency, the survival strategy of fawns and calves is to lie still in
the tall
grass, while Mom is off browsing. That way, the grizzly has to
literally step
on the calf to earn a meal. How does the enterprising grizzly in
Yellowstone,
for example, get around this? After observing the cow, browsing off by
herself,
away from the herd, he concludes there is a calf, and he walks in a
concentric
circle towards the middle of the tall grass or shrubby area, until he
steps on
the calf. Just when you thought bears were stupid! Surviving
winter Moose
tend to struggle more through
a winter of deep snows, as their relatively heavy torsos and sharp
hooves force
them to pole through snow, while wolves not only have snowshoe-like
paws, which
enable them to distribute their weight effectively, allowing them to
run on top
of compacted snow, but share the burden of breaking through lighter,
deeper
snow by following in each other’s wakes, and taking turns leading the
pack. Moose
have the advantage when the
snow is less than about two feet deep, as they've evolved a specialized
trot,
which uses their long legs and high torsos to seem to float above the
shrubs, rocks,
downed trees, and the other obstacles encountered during their flight
from
predators. In addition, they are able to bound over natural barriers
that
wolves and bears would be forced to run around. Once
the snow exceeds two or three
feet, the moose are more likely to defend themselves where they stand,
and the
advantage goes to the wolves, as long as they can avoid being kicked in
the
head or rib cage. There are stretches of winter when heavy snows force
the
moose under sheltered areas, such as the Adirondack forests of white
and red
pines, where much of the snow remains in the branches, and the moose
can “yard
up”, the way white tailed deer do. The trade-off is that this area may
not be
the most efficient place to browse, as the thicker the canopy, the
fewer
deciduous saplings and shrubs are present to provide the inefficient
browse of
woody stems and twigs. At the same time, the expenditure of energy to
get to a
better browse area may not be worth it, and Bergman’s Rule may come
calling
with a vengeance. Be
careful
where you move to One
of the more interesting aspects
of an ecosystem is the endless complexity of the relationships between
flora
and fauna, as well the macro and micro worlds. Each of us is actually a
small
community in which we may occupy the starring role, but are helped, as
well as exploited,
by a bewildering array of parasites and symbiotic partners. As
an example, I have some
disturbing news: even if you brushed your teeth this morning, you still
have
about 50 parasites in your mouth, some of which are beneficial, but
many of
which are better for your dentist, and the higher bill you’ll pay when
you
visit them. When
a friend quips that his stomach
“is talking to him”, he might have said instead: “did I ever tell you
that I
have billions of anaerobic bacteria in my gut and stomach, and they’re
the ones
actually doing the digesting. There’s no chance I could do this on my
own”, an
observation that gives new meaning to the phrase, “Everything in Nature
is
connected”. What
about external parasites like
black fly, mosquitoes and ticks? We may not like what they do, but they
are
playing a role in nature, just not one that benefits us! White
tail deer have been evolving in
North America for 4 million years, while as noted, modern moose crossed
the
Bering land bridge into North America only about 15,000 years ago.
Think about
that disparity for a moment. Being
a curmudgeonly fellow, I sometimes
debate evolution with friends whose objections are not rooted in
religious
fundamentalism or other aspects of our belief systems not related to
science,
or the threads of evidence science may provide. The real difficulty may
be that
while we can conceive of long stretches of time, for example, 4 million
years,
we can not imagine it… we can’t get our minds around it. We’re lucky if
we
individually live 90 years. When we try to figure out our own family
tree, we
usually stumble after five or six generations. Life on earth is nearly
3
billion years old! Evolutionary processes can be excruciatingly slow…
how many
generations of white tails are represented by 4 million years? In the
course of
evolution, 15,000 years is a mere speck in time. The
other aspect of evolution that is
hard to grasp, is the relentless competition, the types of behavior and
adaptation
that enable a species to survive, not just in adversity or cooperation
with
other species, but in relation to our own collection of parasites, our
helpers
and hinderers. When your competitor develops an advantage, you respond
and
adjust successfully, or you join the 99% of animals that have lived on
earth,
who are no longer with us. As said elsewhere, nature is not “fair”, and
it is certainly
not a democracy. Deer
carry parasites such as meningeal
or "brain worm", giant liver fluke and the winter tick, parasites
which deer are able to live with. Moose sharing habitat with deer, pick
up
these parasites, and being relative newcomers to our neck of the woods,
fare
less well. Brain worm and liver flukes are passed to moose
through a
cycle involving deer droppings, snail infection and the ingestion of
leaves
contaminated by deer pellets or snails. Brain
worm, which produce larvae on
the surface of the white tail brain, work through the moose brain
tissue,
destroying the brain, and causing weakness, reduction of equilibrium,
disorientation and often death in moose. Flukes are rarely fatal, but
can work
with other health issues to weaken moose and make them more vulnerable
to
wolves and other natural fates. Deer
are excellent groomers. A white
tail deer will pass through winter with up to 300 ticks, but can detect
and
remove most of the newly hatched seed ticks through licking and rubbing
when
the ticks climb aboard in autumn, often in clumps, from vegetation
brushed by
the deer. The ticks are aided in this boarding strategy by their
ability to
detect the carbon dioxide exhalation of approaching mammals, and the
fact that
excited ticks can quiver, cluster, shake and flip onto the unfortunate
moose,
sort of like dog fleas at their own disco. For
some reason, moose do not feel
the ticks, until they have climbed up the torso and the female ticks
begin
biting and drawing blood, as part of their reproductive cycle. The
winter tick
passes through three developmental stages while on the moose, each of
which
involves taking blood from the moose. By
January, an adult moose may be
carrying anywhere from 10,000 to 80,000 ticks, and while an individual
tick
takes an insignificant amount of blood, moose can reach a tipping point
where
the ticks are removing a significant amount of the blood generated
naturally by
bone marrow and hematopoietic cells, leading to loss of energy. In
addition, the itching caused by
ticks and mites lead the moose to bite at their itchy coats, and
vigorously rub
their bodies incessantly against rough-barked trees, like white and red
pines, leading
to coat loss and possibly hypothermia. These factors, when combined
with the
lower nutrition intake of moose in winter, which, following Bergmann’s
rule,
exposes the moose to possible starvation, threaten the moose’s life,
making the
stretch between mid-March and mid-May the most vulnerable period in an
adult
moose’s year. Warming
climate enables greater
numbers of winter tics, which may help explain why moose are in decline
in much
of their range, including New Hampshire, Vermont and Minnesota.
New York
Times, Oct 14th, 2013: Moose
Die-Off Alarms Scientists. Moose
and
Wolves Just
as our visual acuity, and more
precisely our ability to resolve color, is probably our most important
sense
when it comes to memory, it’s not too much to claim that while sharp
eyesight
and keen hearing are indispensable to wolves, to a large extent the
world comes
to wolves and other canids principally through their noses. After
bears, wolves
have the most efficient and sensitive noses in the mammal kingdom, and
use that
powerful information gathering tool, to read the olfactory record of
the
comings and goings of prey animals, as well as poaching competitors
like bears,
coyotes, bobcats and other wolves. Because
wolves can distinguish different
moose in their territories by smell, and because they assess their
chances
against individual moose by testing them, they develop a history with
each
moose, such that they can elect to approach or avoid any particular
moose they
see or smell. As
noted, moose spend so much time
eating that they’re not great wanderers, and may not move more than
about fifty
miles from the area of their birth, a distance your average wolf pack
may travel
in a single day, during the course of exploring their territories for
moose and
other prey. Because wolves tend to defend huge territories, averaging
about 200
to 500 square miles, an individual moose could spend its entire life
within a
given pack’s territory. Wolves
concentrate their territory
defense by spending more time patrolling their territory’s periphery,
and may
pass through any point on that periphery every two weeks or so. In that
sense,
the moose might as well be the Statue of Liberty, and the wolf pack may
as well
be on that tourist boat that goes around Manhattan Island, because they
keep
running into the same moose in the same general area. It’s
tough
being a Moose! But,
alas, moose have much bigger
problems in nature than living among wolves. Half of all moose develop
arthritis by age ten, due to a combination of genetic predisposition
and
maternal malnutrition during pregnancy, and the fact that moose spend
so much
time standing and eating, supporting those large torsos on their legs.
Cartilage in the knee and hip joints breaks down, leaving the moose in
pain,
hobbled by swollen joints, and, again, vulnerable to attack by the ever
testing
and investigating wolves. Jaw
necrosis is another common fate
for moose. Moose haven’t learned how to floss yet, so the constant
overuse of
the jaw, and the fact that moose are often reduced to chewing on
leafless,
deciduous stems and shoots in winter, results in the jamming of woody
material
between the teeth. The moose will use its rough tongue in attempts to
dislodge
the material, but if it begins to break down and rot, the jaw may
become
infected and weakened, leading to jaw fracture during mastication,
dooming the
moose to slow starvation. Starvation is the number one killer of
all
wildlife, moose included, and sometimes the intervention by wolves may
interrupt a slow and horrible process. What’s
the
story with Adirondack moose? We
all love to see and photograph moose,
and if you’re involved in tourism or hospitality in the Adirondacks,
you know
that moose mean tourist dollars, and another notch in our “Forever
Wild” belt.
More moose could eventually mean wolves and cougars, and other proven
tourist
magnets. The wolves of Yellowstone, by themselves, add $30 million in
revenue annually
to the tourist towns surrounding Yellowstone. So… the apparent decline
of moose
is not a good thing. I
asked Ed Reed a Wildlife Biologist
with the DEC, and our local expert on the moose, what gives: “We
have seen all of our
annual moose population indices, including mortalities, aerial
surveys,
and hunter survey, level off since about 2006. The reasons for
our
population not increasing as expected are unknown at this point, but we
initiated a moose research project this winter in cooperation with ESF,
Cornell, and WCS, to get a handle on moose numbers and population
trends.
The research will involve aerial surveys, DNA analysis from scat
collections, gps
collars, and possibly some other methods. The field work for
this
project will begin in earnest next winter, but we are actively trying
to collar
moose right now. Winter
ticks have been found on a
few moose in the southern part of their range in NY, but not in the
Adirondacks
as yet, so I suspect they are not a factor now. Declines
in moose numbers in other
states are also under investigation, but no scientific studies to date
have
identified a root cause. Some researchers suspect a warming
climate to be
a contributing factor, but the data so far does not confirm that.“ In
short, moose in North America are
still strangers in a strange land, and have to overcome significant
hardships
to survive. No wonder they always look like they have a chip on their
shoulders.
Steve
Hall
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