Natural History

According to Henry Wharton Shoemaker, moose were once found quite far south in Pennsylviana.  In his Pennsylvania Deer and Their Horns (1915), he describes historical accounts of Moose in the Lehigh and Delaware Valleys and in the Alleghenies between Pittsburgh and Altoona.

Alces americanus Jardine as a frequent visitor to Pennsylvania until the beginning of the nineteenth century is now fully established. Many old hunters aver that it was a permanent resident until its extermination, although S. N. Rhoads, the authority on such matters, can find no supporting evidence. In Colonial times the moose was called in Pennsylvania the Black Moose, to distinguish it from the Gray Moose or Wapiti [what we call the elk], but quite a few hunters gave it the quaint name of “Original.” An aged Indian hunter, Tahment Swasen, who wasadmired by the gifted Thoreau, and who hunted in Pennsylvania, has explained the meaning of the name. The moose was supposed to be the ancestor or “daddy” of the entire deer tribe. Hence, was the original representative of the species on earth. This was proved, he said, by the fact that the Moose is found pretty much all over the Northern hemispheres of the world. De Kay says that Moose is a corruption of the Indian word mosee or “wood-eater.” Dr. Schoepf, the distinguished German traveler, mentions the Black Moose as occurring in Northampton County in 1783.It was also reported to him as being prevalent on the Alleghenies between what is now Altoona and Pittsburg [sic]. West of Fort Pitt it had lately been extirpated. H. Hollister, in his fascinating “History of the Lackawanna Valley,” mentions Black Moose being killed in the Capouse Meadows near the present city of Scranton during the last decade of the eighteenth century. James Hennessy, a farmer residing at the Tamarack Swamp in Northern Clinton County, dug up several pairs of fresh looking moose antlers on his property about fifty years ago, showing that the animals had ranged through that region in comparatively recent times.

A curious Indian legend recounted in “More Pennsylvania Mountain Stories,” by the author of these pages, explains the existence of Moose in the Tamarack Swamp. Before the white men came to Pennsylvania Black Moose doubtless bred in the State. They were found all over its extent, judging from accounts of reliable persons. They had their favorite paths, most of which led in a southwesterly direction across the State. They had favorite streams for bathing, like the elk. The Moshannon Creek in Centre County was formerly called Moose-hanne, or Moose stream. In its deep pools they were said by the Indians to perform religious rites when the moon was crescent shaped. There are two Moose Creeks in Clearfield County. They crossed the Delaware River from New York State, near, where the town of Narrowsburg now stands, for after the native stock had been destroyed they came as migrants from the North. “Driven thither by cold, dogs, or wolves,” says Rhoads. From the Delaware they traveled in a westerly direction to Moosic Lake, in Lackawanna County. Great numbers were killed by the first settlers on the slopes of Mount Cobb, or Moosic Mountain,—the “Imperial Moosic” of the poet Caleb Earl Wright. From that region they ventured further South through the Wind Gap in the Blue Mountains, where they were slaughtered by the German pioneers in Northampton and Lehigh Counties.

The name “Original” is remembered by old people along the West Branch of the Susquehanna in Clinton County, showing that they must have crossed that river in the vicinity of Renovo to Keating on their way to their favorite Moshannon. Mr. Rhoads says, that Bartram in his “Miscellanies” refers to the Wapiti as the Original. But it was the name mostly given to the Black Moose. Dr. Merriam, in his splendid “Quadrupeds of the Adirondacks,” a book which no nature lover or sportsman can afford to be without, states that the last Moose in the Adirondacks was killed in 1861. The height of this last specimen, which was a female, was seven feet at the hump and weighed 800 pounds. Among the last men in New York to kill a moose was Hon. Horatio Seymour, Governor of the State, and the antlers were much admired for many years at his home at Deerfield in Oneida County.

Verplanck Colvin in his report on the Adirondack Wilderness in New York, transmitted to the Legislature in April, 1874, says: “As a matter of zoological and general interest, I may mention that in a few of the most remote portions of the wilderness we have met with indications of the Moose, which, to some of the guides seemed unmistakable. This gigantic deer is, however, almost extinct in the Adirondacks, and I would suggest that it be made, in future, unlawful to kill or destroy the animal at any season.”

Those who have heard the old-timers speak of the Original in Pennsylvania say that it was a creature of appalling size. It stood close to eight feet at the hump, and bulls often weighed a ton. The spread of the horns was tremendous, but the creatures handled these appendages with great dexterity (pg. 36-39).

One should not assume that moose were just creatures of the boreal and mixed northern forests.

At one time they were found quite far south in Europe.  The only relict population in Central Europe is the population that is found in the southern Czech Republic, but they were once found throughout central Europe, including much of Germany into the Low Countries.

It would make sense that their original range in North America would have been much more southerly than it currently is. It would simply be fitting with what was once exhibited with moose in Europe.

Caribou were once found throughout Northern New England, as well as northern parts of New York State.  They were also found on Michigan’s UP and in northern Wisconsin and Minnesota. Today, their range in the Lower 48 is restricted to the Selkirk Mountains of Idaho and Washington State.

Moose, like the caribou, could have lived south of where they currently range.

Shoemaker’s work is full of these little anecdotes that challenge conventional notions about historical biogeography.

One should take his work with a grain of salt, but one should realize that he spent a lot of time talking to old pioners in the mountains of Pennsyvlania– and not all of them were the grandaddies of all liars. Some of them certainly were, but others could have been telling accurate stories– well, accurate enough when one understands how limited their zoological knowledge actually was.

If moose lived this far south, they probably never will again.  Before Europeans came to North America, white-tailed deer were not the dominant deer species in Eastern North America. That title would go to the wapiti or “elk.”

Both moose and wapiti evolved in Eurasia and came across from the Bering Land Bridge into North America. Because they had to come so far north to enter North America, they spent generations evolving in environments without temperate parasites.  White-tailed deer were always living in these parasite ridden enviroments, and they carry a lot of deer-specific parasites now.

Wapiti eventually developed a resistance to the parasites, but moose never did.  Moose cannot survive very well in habitats that are full of white-tailed deer.

That area in Pennsylvania is now full of white-tailed deer. White-tailed deer now exist in numbers that far exceed their original numbers, and that means that moose will never be able to thrive in the region.