The dash ( Alces alces ), also called moose in North America, is largest of the Espèce S of deer tribe.

History

Prehistory and the first domestications

If the dash is largest today of the Cervidé S, it was exceeded a long time cuts some by the stag Mégacéros, which cotoyé it until prehistory. Both driven out by the man, the mégacéros completely disappeared, while the dash was confined little by little in circumpolar zone.

The domestication of dashes seems old. The Iakoute S of Siberia used it like draft animal and mounting. This use was later interdict in Russia, bus of the criminals going up of the dashes outdistanced the horses of the police force. The dash was also used to draw from heavy loads on difficult grounds where the horse was inserted. It was domesticated, but nonhigh in herd.

Decline

As for the Aurochs, of the relictuelles populations of dashes survived tardily (until the Middle Ages), at least in the wet plains in France, in Belgium, but also in Switzerland and Germany before hunting does not eliminate it from these regions, until our days. It is attested by texts or remainders (fossil recent) in Gallic France at the time until year 250. There remains in Alsace at least until IXe century. A text mentions a dash killed by two lords of the continuation of Pépin the Brief in Nordlingen (Bavaria) in 764. It is announced in Suisse, as being common until worms the year thousand. In Flanders where the wetlands were still numerous before large the drainage S medieval, the last killed dashes would have been it about the year 900 (after one period of marine invasion which forced undoubtedly them to leave the refuge of the marshes, Roselière S and Forêt S of current the maritime Flanders).

In Central Europe, the dash would have survived hunting until XIVe century in Bohème, and two hundred years moreover, until XVIe century in Mecklembourg, and until 1760 in Galicie, and Hungary until the end of the XVIIIe century

Recent reintroductions

In 1904, dashes were introduced successfully on the island of Newfoundland. Other less profitable attempts were carried out on the island of Anticosti in the Golfe of the St. Lawrence. In 1910, ten dashes were introduced into the Fiordland in New Zealand, but they apparently died out. However, occasional contacts are reported, and it is possible that dashes remain in New Zealand.

Since its hunting is controlled better, of the populations locally reconstituted themselves in certain Russian areas during the XXe century. Populations were recently reconstituted in Siberia (in the East of the Lena: it did not remain about it almost more in 1974; one counts 22.000 to 24.000 of them which benefits from the immense wetlands. A more modest population is reconstituted in Czechoslovakia (with the same latitude as Normandy).

Lifestyle

Behavior

It is an independent animal and recluse in summer, which lives in couple only at the time of the rut (mid-September at mid-October). The males do not form harems. It can however form groups in winter. Shy person in the zones where it often is disturbed or driven out, it can be curious in the zones about calm, while remaining far away from the Man. Certain individuals not hesitating to visit some rural areas (grazing grounds, fields of cereals) or urban, even of the airports or gardens périurbains.

As almost all the animals, it can be aggressive at the time of the rut for the males and during the breeding of small for the females which do not let anybody approach their small with less than 25-30 Of the same Mr. when it is wounded or driven back without possibility of escape.

The dash can traverse important distances and cross arms of rivers to the stroke.

Food mode

It nourishes primarily grass, watery plants which it can brouter the head entirely immersed under water, of foliage, branches and bark and other plants. It incidentally consumes Champignon S, foams and Lichen S.

It is nourished more easily on the bushes and young trees that in forest where the trees are too high so that the sheets are accessible for him. The presence of beavers which recèpent the trees on the banks him is favorable.

Habitat

The dashes live in the northern forests and the mixed forests of leafy trees of the northern hemisphere, under climates moderated with subarctic.

Distribution

In North America, their surface of distribution includes/understands all the Canada and the Alaska, most of the New England, and the north of the Rocky Mountains. After their introduction on Newfoundland at the beginning of the 20th century, they are now the Ongulé dominating of the territory.

In Europe, he saw mainly in the Scandinavian Péninsule (in which he counts 200.000 heads today approximately) and in Russia. Populations Vestigiales remain in several countries of Europe where the dashes were formerly numerous, in the Baltic States, in Czechoslovakia, Poland and Romania. Erratic dashes were announced in Germany of North to the border of the Netherlands, like in Hungary.

In Asia, the dashes are primarily in Siberia, with some groups in China. In a general way, the surface of distribution of the dashes narrowed with time.

A project of reintroduction is being studied in France, in Normandy, in the Marsh Sliding gauge.

Physical characteristics

Its wood is broad and to some extent dishes. Long legs and a long neck allow him brouter the ligneous family, which composes 50% of its supply summer and 80% in winter, like moving easily in water and the mégaphorbiaies by spanning reversed trunks and ronciers. Its widened and webbed shoes enable him to swim in the current and not to be inserted in the soft grounds (vase, snow, Tourbière S with Sphaigne S.).

The unusual length of its legs gives to the dash a particular step (the usual step of the dash is a trot which appears badly assured, but it is able to gallop and reach a speed of 55 km/h). The muzzle is long and hairy except for a small triangular zone under the nostrils. The males have a hairy pocket under the neck, called “bell”. The dashes have a rather short neck which prevents them from feeding, they nourish mainly young branches, growths and sheets of Saule or Bouleau, plants watery, as well as barks of tree and cones in winter. One generally meets these ruminants in the wetlands and marshy close to the rivers. Like a goat, it can be drawn up on its forefeet and by tightening neck brouter in the branches until nearly 3 meters height.

Its teeth resemble that of other ruminants such as the Chevreuil S, the Vache S, the Mouton S or the Chèvre S. On each side of the jaw lower are three molars, three premolars and four teeth front, of which one is a transformed canine. The upper jaw does not contain front teeth, but comprises a plate in horn against which the dash chews its food.

Like other deer tribe, he appreciates and seeks rock salt, can be to compensate for his needs at the time of the annual growth of wood (up to 15-20 kg for the most spectacular foliages).

The males can weigh more than 550 kg, and the females can reach 400 kg. The small ones weigh approximately 15 kg with the birth but grow quickly. The height with the shoulder can exceed two meters. Only the males have wood, which can exceed 1,60 m of width and 20 kg; they are broad and flat with small points. A dash discovered in Alaska in 1897 holds the record of largest cervidé known: this male reached 2,34 m with the shoulder, for 816 kg. The scale of its foliage was of 1,99 Mr. the adult loses 15 to 17% of its live weight each winter, even more at the time of difficult winters.

Nomenclature

Moose or dash?

The moose is the familiar name given to these animals in North America. The origin of the name moose would come from orignac , which is the plural form of a word Basque indicating the Cervidé S. At the first years of the colonies, the first colonists French would have learned it from the Basque S which regularly came to fish the Morue on the coasts of the Atlantique, in particular in the Fleuve the St. Lawrence.

In Europe, the animal is called dash.

Taxonomy

The dash, or Alces alces is a Mammifère Artiodactyle, of the family of the Cervidé S, and group of the Télémétacarpien S.

The species is subdivided in 7 (or 8 according to the authors) subspecies, including four in North America;

British Columbia,…).
  • Alces alces americana : dash of the East of Canada (Is of Ontario, Newfoundland, Maine, Quebec,…).
There exists only one European subspecies:
  • Alces alcas alces says European dash, which is not today any more present at the wild state only in Scandinavia, Finland, Poland, and in some areas of Russia, with a natural return in Czechoslovakia. Of intermediate size, its dress is brown-clearly.
Two subspecies are Asian:
  • Alces alces cameloïdes : dash of Mandchourie (South-eastern of the Siberia, North Is China), smallest, of darker color, rarer and very little studied.
  • Alces alces pfizenmayeri : dash Siberia N which one finds until the Kamchatka; animal of big size which evokes Alces alces gigas .

Ecological functions

This animal, able to cross important lakes and rivers to the stroke to North America, is the only cervidé mammal capable of brouter of the watery plants, the head under water. It thus seems to occupy a particular ecological niche, and it could for this reason have played a big role for the maintenance of the Biodiversité and the potential natural Végétation of the cold and moderated Wetlands. it consumes daily approximately 5% of its weight (either 20 kg approximately of fresh vegetable biomass per adult of 400 kg)

Its presence being attested until the Middle Ages in average Europe (Germany, France), some suggest to it reintroducing in protected wetlands, in complement of the Ovin S, rustic horses or Bovin S used for the management and the restoration of these mediums. Indeed, like that of the other deer tribe, its digestive system is adapted better to the digestion of woody matters than those of the herbivorous animals already present in the reserve, and it is the only one which grazes readily the ligneous family sometimes invading of the écotones wetlands, maintaining, like also the beaver of the released and shone upon accesses does it. At the cold season, he eats from 20 to 25 kg of branches, barks and branches generally of willows, alders and birches, gasolines pionnières taking part in the closing of the wetlands and the massive contributions of dead sheets which contribute to the abnormally fast alluvial deposit of the ponds, peat bogs and wetlands not very deep. Its foot made up of 4 shoes (by leg) connected to some extent by a membrane interdigitaire enables him less to be inserted in the soft sediments and grounds that other species (load from 420 to 440 grams/cm ², against 750 for bovine and 800 for a horse.).

Interest hunting

The dash is driven out in Northern Europe and North America. Its meat is in the Scandinavian countries considered better than that of the stag Elaphe (sold in the years 1990 4 times more expensive than beef). In the zones where the waterfowl is intensively driven out, it seems to be able to be victim of Saturnisme by introducing lead shots toxic, with the food which it grazes under water.

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