Yukon Wildlife Preserve: A day with the animals

I was sad to leave the Hot Springs Hostel where I'd spent almost a week. It was beginning to feel like home, but it was also time to get a change of scenery.

The large preserve has different habitats. This is part of the moose habitat.

The year before, I'd dropped by the Yukon Wildlife Preserve, just a kilometer from the Hostel, but did not go in.

"JB" the cow moose!

However, several people recommended it: Cynthia had been there, and said it was worth going to, as did the dad with the one-year-old in the Hot Spring Pool, so I figured I would go. Besides, I hadn't yet seen a moose that I could photograph, so figured I was guaranteed an opportunity to photograph a moose.

The preserve is 700 acres large, and encompasses several different habitats for the different animals that roam there. They have mountain goats; Stone/Dall sheep; muskoxen; Canadian lynx; red, silver and Arctic foxes; caribou (I think they are actually reindeer, but more on that later); mule deer; moose; elk; and wood bison, which are bigger than American or plains bison. There are also a birds and Arctic ground squirrels that live inadvertently on the Preserve, just because they are native to the environment.

You can walk or bike on the established roads of the preserve by yourself, or you can take a bus tour. Since I wanted to take pictures, I opted to walk the 5km trails myself, in order to have lots of time to watch and wander. I took my umbrella.

Bald eagle

Since this excursion was really about the animals and about photography, I don't think I'm going to say that much here. It's really about the photos.

Wildlife photography

So wildlife photography is REALLY challenging. I'm learning, but all those superb shots that you see in National Geographic or nature magazines are taken by photographers with better equipment, longer lenses, and a LOT of time.

Even at a place like this, where you are guaranteed to see animals, it's still a challenge. Light can be wrong, you're shooting through fences, so it can be hard to focus, plus the animals move around a lot, so you have to take many shots in order to get one that works.

"Mom! Wait for me!" Wood bison calf runs after mama.

So even though they are at a preserve, the animals are entirely free to roam, and since these are natural habitats, not zoos, they hide in the grass, or wander across the landscape. And they are wild animals, even though they are somewhat habituated to humans. There were a number of times when they just took off from some perceived threat or just the urge to go somewhere else.

Fireweed blooming below the cliffs in the mountain goat habitat. And yes, there were mountain goats on the cliffs.

I have countless pictures of headless birds, elk rumps, bison behinds, and deer derrieres. I'll make a collection of those sometime, as they might even be funny if the best of them are collected together.

That all said, this was a fantastic opportunity to get a little bit closer (most of the time) to some of these animals. It was a great day.

Mountain mama and kids. In this habitat, there were at least two nanny goats and three kids. They all took off and ran away into the forest as I approached. The adults are all shedding their heavy winter coats for the summer, and throughout their habitat the trees and bushes are coated with shed hair. It makes the adults look somewhat unkempt. In the natural environment, the First Nations people do collect this and spin it for weaving. 

Adult mountain goat.
Both males and females have horns, so I'm not sure which this is, but whichever, I was entranced with the "bang" or combover effect. And yes, that's a fly on his/her face.

Woodland caribou.
If you click on the link, you'll be able to read about the caribou at the preserve. Probably more than you ever want to know, so I won't repeat it here. These are large animals, and those antlers are truly impressive.

FEED ME! Baby swallow. There were lots of swallows flying around. I didn't realize that some of them were babies until this one was sitting on the fence, all nice and quiet, but then as another approached, it started flapping and opening its mouth. Turned out the parent was nearby and the baby was still demanding food!

Thinhorn sheep ram.
This is a Stone sheep. They are darker than the Dall sheep, which are white. They are impressive animals, especially when you are so close to them.

Thinhorn sheep lamb. 

Prickly rose (Rosa acicularis)
Not only were there animals, but there were beautiful flowers, too. The roses are still in bloom, although they are starting to fade and form bright orange hips. Time is passing!

Mountain death camus (Zygadenus elegans).
This is actually a poisonous plant, but the aphids don't seem to mind!

Arctic fox.
There were three Arctic foxes in their habitat, and they were molting from their winter white to summer brown fur. Like all animals at this unfortunate stage, they looked pretty unkempt. You can see how much longer and thicker the white fur is than the dark brown fur! This particular fox was intent on the lynx in its adjoining habitat. It was very restless, and it was hard to get pictures through both the fence and the grasses. At one point the fox started EATING the grass, which was pretty endearing, since it reminded me of our dogs at home that do this. And then throw up.

At the Preserve, they also had a red fox and a silver fox, but they were both sleeping, and I didn't get good pictures. The red fox had been a rescue; it was found as a tiny kit, in fact so small that the people who found it thought it was a dog and nursed it. Only as it grew larger did they realize they had a fox! The community came together and collected the money to create a fox habitat for it.

Canadian lynx. Again, I felt lucky to get this picture. I've never seen one in the wilderness.

Gorman's beardtongue (penstemon gormanii).
Believe it or not, the color is THAT intense — no post-processing saturation intensity increases here!

Muskox.
These were far away, and never, ever looked up. They just kept their heads down and ate and ate. They are like animal lawnmowers. There were supposed to be baby muskoxen, too, but I never saw them. The enclosures are so large that they can easily get out of sight. And as you can tell, they are molting, too. I didn't ask about harvesting the qiviut, but they probably do not do it from these animals, since these are intended to be as wild as possible. Those muskox horns are deadly, and I have been told that these animals are very unpredictable. 

Cow moose. I will probably never get so close to a moose again in my life. Unlike most of the animals at the preserve, this particular one had actually been bottle raised and came right over to the fence. If you click on the link above, there is a delightful movie about this particular moose! 

Mule deer.
In all honesty, it was a little hard to get excited about mule deer because they are so common, but I did learn the differences between white-tail deer and mule deer, so hope to retain that information. 

Arctic ground squirrel. 
Yes, it's hard to really get excited about these little critters either, but they are just so darn cute. I could devote an entire post to them!

Bull elk.

I pretty much closed up the place, and it had begun to rain in earnest, so it really was time to leave. It had been a pretty wonderful day.