More Than One Way to Die, part IV Orphan Moose

I realize this is not a very glamorous subject to write or read about but animals rescued from the wild are not all fairy-tale features. Those individuals having the revered interest and opportunity to take part in saving lives deserve to be told the whole story. And sadly, this is one of those chapters.

.....Baby had been grooming herself excessively. I never knew moose were such clean creatures. She is a veritable yoga guru elongating her neck to stroke bony shoulders with a thick muscled tongue that darts in and out with snake-like precision. Hind legs extend forward with flexibility of a gymnast to appease her forehead. I watched and wondered at this sprucing up ritual. Once I observed her curl velvety lips back to open passage for teeth and savagely rip out a tuft of brittle hair from her whithers. I thought this odd and jotted a note in my journal as a sign of orphan oddities. Curiosity compelled me to research this obsessive behavior. Inscesent grooming could be a comfort practice I imagined. She was without the reassurance of an adult and needed consolation
......How wrong surface impressions can be. Another barbaric act of nature had reared its hideous head. Baby was covered with reddish-gray blobs of blood-sucking ticks over one-fourth of her tiny body. We had no way of telling how many lay burrowed beneath the hide but there were an observable 30-50 exposed on patches of bare skin. Baby's concentrated grooming tactics were on-going labors to purge these blood-sucking demons from her flesh. A species called Dermacentor Albipictus or winter Ticks. *

.....Winter ticks kill. They cause blood loss, itching, inflammation and skin ulcerations. Ticks winter over in moose as well as deer and elk. Animals become infested in late summer to early autumn when they contact lumps of tick larvae on tips of vegetation.* By November ticks molt to nymphs and in January begin feeding. They peak in mid-February and molt into adults.* (Mid-February was when we first noticed the largest ones on her rump.) Numbers peak in late March through April and all drop off by mid-May.* The moose can live tick free until late summer when the cycle starts over again.* Winter ticks however are most prevalent south of 60 degrees latitude.* When winters are as horrid as the ones we have been battling, food is meager and vital protective fur drops off due to tick infestation. Malnutrition and exposure are the bold indisputable signatures found on their death certificates.

...What would be our course of action given this new information? Only what is within our power; extra food, more attention and greater love. We boosted Baby's intake of deer feed adding cracked corn. Coincidence or cure we aren't sure, but within a week we started finding dead ticks in the driveway, on the ground around her bed and on our back porch some as large as grapes. The land leeches were falling off as Baby sustained her grooming routine with vengeance. Innovation sparked new ways to rid her body of these hostile pests. She utilized the hoods of our vehicles by rubbing her chest and cheeks insatiably back and forth across the fenders and grills crushing ticks to death. I want to believe the warmth from those engines also allowed her a brief respite from the agony. All though these types of ticks do not prefer human hosts * it is a constant sanitation effort around our abode. But how reassuring to see gentle tufts of hair growing back over the ravaged skin.

.....I know without a doubt had we not intervened in the salvation of this immature moose we all would have discovered there is more than one way to die out here. I trust that with our continued efforts Baby will live to create the next generation.

Playing llfe by ear ... No regrets eh?

I'm getting anxious. My findernails are nubs, I've gained too much winter weight and I'm tired of my own cooking. As much as I love the snow and how beautiful it is and how much fun it is to play in and shovel, and plow and mop up off the floors, I am really getting cabin fever. So today I begin planning our summer sabatical. From the Redwood Forests to the Inside Passage, a long, lean ride of a lifetime. I'm talking three-wheelin it. I have a classic 1988 Goldwing 1500 with a Motor Trike conversion on it and I Loooove my hot ride. There is so much more to experience straddling a leather seat; wind in my hair, bugs on my windshield, rain in my face and all those other motorcyle cliches. They are all true by the way.
..... However, I feel there needs to be a theme to guide us. How insane would it be just to hit the open road and play life by ear? Last year it was National Parks, I love our National Parks. I feel we need to enjoy them while they last because they are not always going to be there. What else isn't going to be here in ten or thirty years that I will regret not seeing if I don't go?
.....Twelve weeks and counting, who else would like to go or ride along the way?

Solitude or Sanctuary? Orphan Moose Part III

We have named her Baby. We watch her lumber through chest deep snow, she travels with deliberate energy-saving steps. Another blizzard hit last night at our Pacific Northwest homestead adding two more feet of freezing snow to our all ready seven foot drifts. On clear days Baby roams about the neighborhood. On blustery days she huddles beneath a large doug fir fifty feet from our back door. Here she has hallowed out a resting spot in the snow next to her feeding station and salt block. I can capture her moods and moves from my bathroom window or back porch without invading her space.

...Experts say that moose are solitary, individualistic animals desiring privacy and space. But I wonder if this orphan feels the same way. She pops into view when our truck comes down the driveway, she makes the local deer and magpies her friends and she always finds the way to her bed by sunset. As an orphan, is the inherited desire for solitude overpowered by the need for sanctuary? Of all the studies on can do on moose behavior, I don't imagine they have one that measures desire or emotion beyond sexual activity. Maybe it is only important ot me. So let it be known that the remarks I make here are strictly my own observations and commentary influenced by my own feelings and emotions.

....I believe emotions are practiced by all creatures. I have observed what appears to be contention, curiosity and concern revealed in her walk, her gaze and the twitching of her ears. Laid back the ears have been known to mean don't-get-to-close, but it could also mean she is listening for sounds from behind.* Cocked forward the ears are in position to alert her to signals that lie ahead; couriousity or cautionary. The ears outwardly erect fro her body have been known to be an expression of concentration and more intent listening.* Ears pointed down and laid back is a display of attack or merely listening to sound from below.* I always honor the 'display of attack' message just to be on the safe side.

.....She flips her fuzzy infant ears forward when she sees Marti serving her morning meal. She prances about slipping on icy paths conflicted between the need to eat and an entrenched fitght or flight response. When we are out of sight she ambles between vehicles, even wanders onto the porch because she can smell the apple box. Curiosity, I believe, has helped her expand a confort zone around us and our abode. However she remains alert and anxious keeping a respectable distance when we share the same ground. I am glad to see this morsel of fear smoldering beneath the surface. That fear will help insure a longer adult life for her after she leaves us. Till then I will do my part to make her feel safe and independent. I will sustain an enviornment where she is comfortable and adored and we both can spend some quality time trying to figure out the importance of solitude and sanctuary.

*Ecology and Management of the North Amerian Moose, Wildlife Management Institute, Compiled and edited by Albert Franzman and Charles Schwartz