Comments on: Maine’s Mystery Moose

By: alchemical

alchemical — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 04:05:57 +0000

You all may enjoy this photograph I took today.

This guy resides at a sporting goods/gift shop in Errol, New Hampshire and shows the “dirty grey” color described in the article. I am not sure exactly when it was shot, or where, but it’s quite impressive all the same. His size wasn’t anything shocking but the color was just beautiful.

By: Loren Coleman

Loren Coleman — Sat, 24 Feb 2007 18:01:34 +0000

I’ve added an old graphic to the beginning of the blog, thanks to Michelle Souliere, and moved the albino moose photograph from New Brunswick to the middle of the article.

By: kittenz

kittenz — Thu, 22 Feb 2007 00:33:09 +0000

Megaloceros was a genus which included several species, some smaller than modern moose (the plural of moose is moose), some larger. Individuals of some species were close to 3 meters at the withers, which is larger than any subspecies of modern moose. They probably were not quite as heavily built as the giant moose Alces latifrons, which was slightly larger than even the largest known Megaloceros. Although no confirmed fossils of Megaloceros species have been found in North America, fossil material that may be from Megaloceros has been found in North America, but it is too fragmentary to be conclusively referred to that genus. The modern moose has a boreal circumpolar distribution, as do caribou and the animals known in North America as wapiti and in Europe as red deer. Alces latifrons was also circumpolar; its fossils have been found in Alaska and northern Canada. I don't think it's too much of a stretch to suppose that Megaloceros was circumpolar as well; I believe that it's just a matter of time until undoubted fossils of that species turn up here. But alas, I doubt that any survive to the present. As I said before, that's wishful thinking. The modern moose is thought to have evolved from Alces latifrons or an animal closely related to it. Maybe this Mystery Moose is a throwback.

By: Loren Coleman

Loren Coleman — Tue, 20 Feb 2007 15:22:42 +0000

Moose are the largest members of the deer family; they are cervids.

They drop their antlers, and I have a couple, one of which I display at the foot of the “Crookston Bigfoot.”

From Wikipedia:

The male moose will drop its antlers after mating season in order to conserve energy for the winter season. It will then regrow them in the spring. The antlers take about three to five months to grow. This makes their antlers one of the fastest growing organs in the world. The antlers initially have a layer of skin, which will shed off once fully grown.

By: MrInspector

MrInspector — Tue, 20 Feb 2007 15:11:38 +0000

I’ve never hunted moose and so I don’t know a lot about them, I prefer elk and carribou, much tastier.
Do Moose keep their antlers or do they shed them like deer?

By: Sordes

Sordes — Mon, 19 Feb 2007 18:42:28 +0000

The Megaloceros is often called the largest deer that ever existed. In fact even modern north-american mooses are about twice the size of Megaloceros, which reached only about the size of the smaller european moose, only the antlers were the biggest ones. And even the giant mooses are not the largest known deers. I don´t believe in surviving megafauna in “civilized” regions, and also not in the survival of Megaloceros.

BTW, the really largest known deer was the broad-fronted moose Alces latifrons which reached a weight of 1400kg and had huge antlers. But it is also only known from Europe.

By: skeptik

skeptik — Mon, 19 Feb 2007 13:09:33 +0000

The Norwegian elk is smaller than the American moose, and having elks sleep outside my bedroom window has made me realize how big a moose would be then.

Last year there was a white elk in Norway that was eventually protected by law after much debate (with picture).

By: RockerEm

RockerEm — Sun, 18 Feb 2007 08:12:05 +0000

ummm I don’t know much about moose but I’ve never heard of a white moose before so…..this might be something not recorded.

By: Cryptonut

Cryptonut — Sun, 18 Feb 2007 06:02:47 +0000

I know it’s a moose, but it reminds me of the movie “The White Buffalo”!

By: mauka

mauka — Sat, 17 Feb 2007 22:43:53 +0000

I have lived in Maine all but one year of my life. It is to bad that I do not see may moose on the coast. I am however wishing I had heard of this alleged animal sooner.