RED DEER –
A Red Deer man encountered an unlikely four-legged enemy while walking around his neighborhood.
On a recent evening walk through his southeast community, Anders on the Lake, David Meredith spotted an elderly moose.
Curious, he hid behind a tree and watched, but not for long.
“He ended up bluffing,” Meredith said during an interview with CTV News. “So I took this opportunity to scream like a little girl and run up that tree.”
He added: “I really had nowhere to go.”
Once she was off the ground and safer in the branches of the tree, Meredith pulled out her phone and started recording.
He assumed the animal would move, but instead it began to dash back and forth and use its horns to rustle the branches of the trees.
“He was grunting and had every intention of stepping on me if he looked,” Meredith said.
“It was pretty embarrassing,” he told CTV news Edmonton. “The pictures don’t show how close it felt.”
Meredith estimated he was in the tree for 10 to 15 minutes before the moose finally ran off.
Red Deer resident David Meredith points to the tree he climbed after encountering an aggressive moose while walking in his Anders on the Lake neighborhood.
WATCHING MOOSE HONORS, AGGRESSION LESS
Meredith has lived in the same neighborhood for 22 years and has always gone out for evening walks at the same time.
“Once in a while you see a rabbit, a deer. A lot of ducks,” he said, adding that animal sightings have become more common since the pandemic.
“Since everyone is locked up and doing nothing, it looks like the animals have moved into town.”
Doug Evans, Red Deer City Park Planner, said moose sightings are relatively common in the area — but the aggression Meredith encountered is not.
“This one is a little unpredictable,” Evans said, noting that aggression is more common during track season. “It’s not something we usually see.”
Doug Evans, a Red Deer city park planner, said moose sightings are relatively common in Red Deer, but the aggression David Meredith encountered was not.
He believes the moose was simply spooked.
“These are circumstances that can happen,” Evans said. “If there’s something you can put between the animal and you to protect you, that’s always the first instinct.”
He said Meredith did well on the date.
“If the animal becomes more aggressive and you have to climb a tree or get over a fence, that’s what you have to do.”
“JUST LEAVE THEM”
Although he’s a little scared himself, Meredith doesn’t plan on stopping his walks, but he did remind other park users.
“These big game coming through the cities are wild animals, no matter what you do or talk to them or keep your distance or whatever – they can cover a lot of ground pretty quickly, as the video shows.
“I think just leave them and take your shots from a distance and let them do their thing. I don’t think their intentions are to hurt us in any way. Just don’t provoke them or give them a reason to feel scared. Live with them, I guess.”
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