Mother moose turns tables on grizzly bear chasing her calves, trail camera video shows

A series of well-placed trail cameras captured a moose and her calves desperately fleeing a charging grizzly bear, and the clever way the mother turned the tables on their pursuer.

It’s rare to witness even part of a life-or-death chase in nature, much less follow it from start to finish, but a pair of lucky wildlife enthusiasts managed to do so with a collection of trail cameras hidden around an unspecified stretch of Yukon, Canada, video shows.

Benoit Gervais, a lifetime hunter and outdoorsman, installed the cameras with the help of a friend, Jill Johnson, he told McClatchy News in a Nov. 26 email.

“She has an eye for wildlife, she could spot a mouse in a corn field,” Gervais said. She has “the game eye.”

“So everywhere we went, we would always be on the lookout for signs, tracks of wildlife, and if a spot looked promising, we’d set up a camera,” he said.

Gervais retrieved SD cards from the cameras in August, he said, then shared what the cameras witnessed in a recent Facebook post.

The first camera captures a family of moose, a cow and two calves, standing alert at the edge of a copse of trees before suddenly bolting out of frame, video shows. At first it’s unclear what spooked the trio. Then a grizzly bear emerges from the treeline, its eyes locked on the prey.

Seconds later, the moose enter the view of another camera as they gallop into a pond surrounded by tall grass and scorched trees.

“The moose pond is in an old burn, filled with willows that provide food for the moose and a little patch of mature spruce for shelter. Which makes it a great place for the cows to raise their calves,” Gervais said. But there may be another very good reason moose like to hang around the pond.

Video shows the grizzly is just feet away from the mother as it splashes into the pond. Suddenly, the sprinting predator is slowed to a crawl, out of its element and swimming in a style best described as a doggy paddle — but it isn’t giving up.

It’s not until the third video that the bear realizes what a mistake it’s made. The mother moose seems to realize this as well.

Now towering above the grizzly in the water, the moose turns around, flanked by its calves, video shows. She stares down the bear for a moment, lets out a low growl and then charges, her long powerful legs easily breaking through the water.

The bear immediately retreats, apparently concluding the moose has it outmatched in the water, and it paddles back to shore in defeat, video shows.

“I first thought that the pond was only a source of food, but I realized with these videos that it’s way more vital than that. They’ve been using it for protection,” Gervais told McClatchy.

Viewers were impressed with the mother moose’s courage and cleverness, and with Gervais and Johnson’s camera placement.

“WOW. Absolutely incredible. Momma of the year right there too!” a commenter wrote.

“Mamma moose switched the advantage in the water!” wrote another.

“She did a great job,” one comment read. “Even a bear knows not to mess with a moose.”

Still, some wondered if things ended happily for the moose after the video ended.

“They got out of this one unharmed,” Gervais said in the comments.

Moose far outnumber people in Yukon. According to territory officials, there are roughly 46,000 people living in Yukon and an estimated 70,000 moose.

Large and powerfully built, an average male moose stands a little more than 6 feet tall and weighs about 1,100 pounds.

While they’re not generally considered aggressive, they can be in some circumstances.

“Normally, moose are not aggressive; however a moose that is stressed, a bull moose in the fall rut or a cow moose protecting her young may be easily provoked into an attack,” according to the government of Alberta.

This story was originally published November 26, 2024 at 3:59 PM with the headline "Mother moose turns tables on grizzly bear chasing her calves, trail camera video shows."