It’s cold out there…
Much of the United States and Canada just spent last weekend enduring bitter cold, buckets of snow and high winds. A number of states saw below zero temperatures, with some approaching record lows.
And while us humans are braving the elements, it’s hard out there for animals too.
Food sources become extremely scare when vegetation is covered in snow. Carnivores have a harder time hunting, it’s just a rough deal for pretty much everything out in the woods.
This video recently went viral of a deer whose face was completely frozen over. Although the deer was still able to walk and breathe, its mouth, eyes and nose were completely covered in a frozen layer of ice and snow.
The white caudal patch on its rump was a giveaway that we were probably dealing with some species of roe deer here, which made me dig a little deeper into the video.
Not native to North America, this deer was actually found in Kazakhstan quite years ago, not in America last week, as has been misreported in a number of places recently.
Nevertheless, bravo to the folks who helped this poor deer out.
Here’s the description from the video:
“Two Kazakhstan residents Abylaikhan Kuandyk and Nurzhan Makayev found a roe deer on the road. The men were intrigued by the untypical behavior of the animal – it was standing quietly with its head down.
The roe deer’s muzzle was encased in ice and snow, so the animal could hardly move or see anything. The men seized hold of the roe to rescue it and took off all ice and snow from its head.
After the impromptu rescue operation the roe run away into the fields.”
Well done fellas.
Ice Fishermen Drill Their Hole Right Into A Moose Frozen Into The Ice
That would be the surprise of a lifetime.
But, that’s why we get out there…
Ice fishing is a bridge between seasons. An activity to get you outside and fishing through the winter months, but not something we long for year-round.
It’s cold out there and the action just isn’t the same as the summer months.
Lots of animals use waterways to cut down their travel time. Moose, deer, bears or elk have all been seen swimming or walking across a frozen body of water at some point.
The problem is animals don’t have the ability to always judge how safe a given situation is. They could have crossed at the same spot at the same time a year prior but on this day the conditions could be unsafe.
Especially when it comes to ice. For humans, we have safety measures and always check the thickness prior to use. For a moose, the just hope for the best and send it out onto the lake.
Moose are a large animal to be risking it on ice. A bull moose can weigh up to 1,500-pounds with your average being closer to 1,000 pounds. That’s a lot of weight to going on thin ice.
These fellas where out for an ice fish when the came across something cool while drilling a fishing hole. A set of antlers just barely poked out through the ice.
The fisherman is seen drilling around the antlers hoping to get them out.
That’s a neat find for a day on some ice but a whole lot of work to get it out.
