Moose: Giant of the Northern Forest

Patrick Colgan is the former executive director of the Canadian Museum
of Nature.

This celebration of the moose by writer and nature photographer Bill
Silliker, Jr., covers many aspects of the natural history and current
status of the majestic species: evolution and range of the different
subspecies, courtship and maternal behavior, and life history and
interactions with humans. Beyond the traditional hunting and more recent
conservation practised by humans, predation comes from grizzly bears,
cougars, and especially wolves. Of particular interest are the
author’s accounts of his own contacts with moose, and of aspects of
their biology such as susceptibility to parasitic brainworm carried by
white-tailed deer, wallowing during the mating season, and the precise
photoperiodism that leads to shedding the velvet of the huge antlers
grown annually. The light, flowing text is set amid large, lush
photographs, whose excellence is the product of much painstaking
fieldwork at many locations in North America.