It was a warm spring day with bright sun when we visited the Parc mid-March. Things to look for at that time of year include antlers having falling off, or not, and maybe a bear or two out of their dens.
The arctic wolves, which were moved to the Parc restaurant/gift shop, have become more acclimatized to the location. In past visits we were lucky to see one or maybe two hiding in the far corners, today four provided fairly good photo-ops.
We arrived at opening time, the "toll collectors" were still on their way to work😊
Two bull elk were sitting out on the ice at one of the lakes.
An elk and a red deer seemed quite happy to show they were still holding on to their full set of antlers.
The antlers fall off in the spring. We spotted a few deer and elk with only one antler remaining. When a one-antlered red deer turned its head, it was not a pretty sight. The antler falling off does leave a wound, that briefly bleeds and then forms a scar. "They" say the deer feels no pain when losing their antlers.
The Corsican Mouflon are becoming more at home in their enclosure, but they still seem to not like people stopping to take photos of them.....
For the past 5 years or so visitors are not allowed to feed the buffalo/bison. (It is difficult to persuade a buffalo to take its head out of your car window😊). But that hasn't stopped them from approaching cars and hoping someone might break the rules.
Tico the moose had lost his antlers, but one of the big bulls in a separate enclosure still had his headful.
All of the fur bearing animals grew a thick coat of fur this past winter. This fallow deer was a good example
Many of the fallow deer that live in the Land of the Pioneers area seem to enjoy spending time sitting out on the frozen trout pond.
While I am not sure the coat on the wild boars is referred to as fur, perhaps more hair, but they too grew a thick coat over the winter
With their cohabitants not awake from hibernation yet, the wolves in with some cinnamon bears and the coyotes with the black bears seemed to be looking for something to do.
The red foxes in with another group of cinnamon bears were content to relax, while the silver foxes living with the Rocky Mountain goats were busy running around.
The pileated woodpeckers were enjoying themselves at the Parc. One was working a dead tree close to the entrance and a pair were down by the trout pond, accompanied by a hairy woodpecker. Judging by the amount of preening one pileated was doing, I suspect one of the pair at the pond was the same one we saw earlier close to the entrance
The wild turkeys were enjoying the offerings of corn and sunflower seeds
When we drove by the bear enclosures in the morning no bears were to be seen. Dropping by again in the afternoon we saw the warm sun had enticed one cinnamon bear out to explore. As we watched that one, another emerged from its den, looked about, turned around and went back into the den. In the video there is a split second of one bear scratching its back. I turned the video off too soon but managed to get it going again just as he finished the scritching. The still shot below is an extract from the video .
The warmish temperatures had melted some of the snow which made for frozen waterfalls
During the winter the Parc adds dog sled rides as an attraction. The dogs are very enthusiastic.
