Waterton Lakes National Park - March 2013

Hi Folks

Just wanted to share a couple of videos from my most recent trip. I hope you enjoy them.

This was a solo 3 day/2 night trip into Waterton Lakes National Park. Total distance covered was only about 40 km with a maximum difference in elevation of about 75m from 1,260m to 1,335m, over and over and over..... Night time low temperature was -12 to -14 deg C with a daytime high of 0 deg C. Saw a pile of whitetail deer and about a dozen elk, including the 6x6 herd bull but they never let me get closer than 200m. The mule deer, on the other hand....

Jungle Jim

Cool! Loved the deer. That was neat. Beautiful area!!

I've never seen a deer so tame, that just seems weird! Very cool though, talk about up close and personal!

I'm pretty certain these mule deer are part of the "herd" that spends time in the village of Waterton. There are bighorn sheep that winter in the village.

Because Alberta doesn't use salt on the roads like most other parts of Canada in winter, it makes it harder for the critters to find it, I'm told. It also cuts down on vehicle collisions with the wildlife - a good thing in my books. Anyways, the deer in the video seemed to be after the salt on my skin from my morning's exertion but may have smelled other food on me (like the oatmeal I had for breakfast or the peanut butter and honey burritos I was carrying as day food). Just to be clear, I do NOT feed wildlife, either deliberately or accidentally by leaving food where they can get to it. The deer's behavior was a big surprise to me too.

Jungle Jim

I want one! Can you post one over to me?

Looked cold and windy. Glad you had fun. Definitely a park deer. Thanks for posting. There's a fella on my back road that feed's the deer and the wild turkeys. I drove by yesterday and there were about 15 turkey's in the yard.

bill

I was in a park and had a 3 point buck come right up wanting to be fed, its,a little scary

Looks like you had fun! Thanks for sharing.

Mule dear looks a lot friendlier then a koala :D

Grtz Johan