The National Park Service advises humans to stay at least 25 yards away from wild animals, but what happens when the animals approach you?
Usually it’s best to stay calm and slowly back away. There’s never really a situation where you should run, as that could activate a wild animal’s instinct to chase. However, things get a little tricky when a waffle covered in maple syrup and butter enters the picture.
It’s difficult to figure if anyone is at fault in this video below. The woman from Alaska who posted the clip made sure to point out that she didn’t provoke or encourage this massive moose to walk over to her porch, and I think I believe her. The only reason the large animal walked over there is because it was interested in the waffle, and who doesn’t like carbs smothered in sugar?
She told the story of how the encounter came to be in the caption of the post, and again, made sure to clarify that she didn’t lure over the moose:
“This young moose showed up and had breakfast with me. Now, I was already outside. We were moving and this guy blocked the path to the U-haul. We took the opportunity to get breakfast. I was standing outside holding my plate watching him. I sat my plate down to take a picture and this happened. The moose approached me, I was in NO way teasing or enticing him.”
The woman made sure to clarify only because the moose really tried to take a bite out of the toaster waffle that was sitting on the plate on the front porch. When the wild animal went for it, she grabbed the plate and pulled it back as she told the moose “no” over and over again.
And just in case people still didn’t believe she wasn’t trying to get the moose to take the waffle, she elaborated further in the caption:
“I was up on my deck BEHIND the railing. I was safe and so was he. It is illegal to feed them and doing so causes them to not fear humans and then they get put down. That’s not what we want. I also fill my freezer with wild game and don’t want my hunting privileges taken from me. NO, I did not give the moose any.”
Hey, we hear you loud and clear lady. It’s great that the moose didn’t get any of the syrup-soaked waffle, though it did make for a rather entertaining video (especially when the moose innocently went back to snacking on the nearby branch):
