‘Animal Magnetism’ Can Be A Burden

Wild ungulates seem to be weirdly attracted to me.

I know it sounds strange, or even sick if you can’t remember exactly what an ungulate is, and you vaguely recollect that it is something like a hermaphrodite.

Well, you recollect wrong. An ungulate is a hoofed animal, and a wild ungulate is the kind of hoofed animal that roams free in the untracked wilderness searching for food, water and columnists from Spokane, Wash.

Mountain goats and moose are the two ungulates most fond of attacking me, although maybe instead of “attacking,” I should say they are fond of violating my personal space. The mountain goat incident was certainly not an attack, although it started me wondering if maybe these creatures were attracted to my personal charm, or at least to my B.O.

The moose incident was much more dangerous, much more Hemingwayesque, much more man-in-the-elemental-struggle-against-nature, although possibly the drama was diminished by the fact that the moose was fully sedated.

I’ll explain that later, but first let me tell you about the mountain goat incident. My friend Rich and I were trekking through the backcountry high above timberline in the Beartooth Mountains in Montana last August when there, silhouetted against the saw-toothed skyline, we saw the very symbol of the high country, not to mention the symbol of the Great Northern Railway, the majestic mountain goat.

Rich began shooting photos with his telephoto lens until he noticed that he didn’t need the telephoto lens anymore. The goat was approaching us in what seemed a purposeful manner. This was a goat on a mission, and that mission was us.

Even more alarming, the goat seemed to be trying to circle around behind us. Whenever an animal with large sharp horns tries to approach from the rear, a threat is at least implied.

Soon it was obvious that the goat was somehow fixated on me, possibly even amorously. This goat was clearly a billy, yet this did not assuage my fears; if anything, it made me more nervous.

Meanwhile, Rich was wildly shooting photos.

“This is amazing!” he said. “Hey, I think I might be able to get you both in the same frame. Stay right where you are! Don’t turn around! Look right at me!”

So I did. Rich got the photo, and then I turned around to discover the mountain goat’s horns approximately one foot from my butt.

As I said, the goat never charged. This was not an attack. If anything, the goat just stared at me with a look of silent, yet profound, affection.

I ran like the wind.

I had put the whole thing out of my mind until last Saturday, the day of the moose incident. Two friends and I had just arrived at the Mount Spokane cross-country ski hut when my keenly tuned wilderness senses detected a little moose calf floundering around in the snow, looking ornery and hungry. By “little” you should understand that she was the size of William “Refrigerator” Perry.

Remembering the goat incident, and one or two long-ago confrontations with moose, I decided to keep my distance. The uniformed authorities were already there to sedate the misguided little thing and haul her down to more suitable winter range.

So I just stood there on my skis, leaning on my poles, watching this little drama take place. They sedated the moose, and then each of them grabbed a hoof and started sliding her down the snowy slope toward the parking lot and waiting truck.

Suddenly, I realized that the sliding moose had made a sharp left turn, and was headed directly at me, as if I had some kind of - animal attraction? - when it comes to large Rocky Mountain mammals. I tried frantically to back out of the way, but backing up is something I have not mastered on skis. I fell right on my Polar-Tec padded rear end, with the moose still careening straight for me.

It was a near thing. I swear, I could feel her hot moose breath on my face as I stuck my skis straight up in the air and desperately tried to claw my way out of moose range. Fortunately, the men managed to put the brakes on that moose just inches away from a tragic moose-man collision.

That was the end of the incident. The rest was mere awkward scrambling.

Later that day, I tried, upon retelling the story, to make it sound a lot more macho, as if a wild moose had charged me in a rage and I was alive to tell the story only because my innate survival instincts had spurred me to superhuman feats of skill and strength.

But honesty forced me to add the following footnote at the end: “By the way, the moose was comatose at the time.” Some of my more critical listeners felt that this took the steam out of the whole story.

Maybe I am making too much of these two incidents. The goat may have had perfectly innocent intentions, and as for the moose, she didn’t even know I was there. Yet somehow, I still like to think that ungulates and I have shared a few - special moments.

Fleeting, yes. But sometimes, late at night I take out that photo of me with my goat and I say in a hushed, Bogart kind of voice, “At least we’ll always have the Beartooths.”

, DataTimes The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Jim Kershner The Spokesman-Review