Great moose photos and funny comments

I’m a fan of Paul Cyr’s photography, and his new book, Uses for Mooses, published by Down East Books, demonstrates why.

The moose photos in this book are amazing. And the book is also a fun read, with lots of humorous comments to go with the photographs. For example, there’s a photo of a cow and two calves, staring at us, with the cow telling her calves, “Act natural. The humans are staring at us again.” There’s a fabulous photo of two bulls fighting, with the caption, “Swing your partner round and round.”

You’ll see moose in rivers and streams, fields and forests, and even on a golf course. I loved the photo of a moose stomping through a farm garden with the caption, “I don’t know what these plants are, but that farmer sure gets mad when I step on them.” Mad, indeed!

My favorite photo brought back a memory, and a story that’s in my book, A Life Lived Outdoors. The photo is of the head of an old moose with a ragged rack emerging from the water. My wife Linda and I, along with our kids, were canoeing in Little Sourdnahunk Lake one August, watching an old moose with a spindly rack standing in the pond, eating plants. His head was covered in flies.

When the moose ducked his head under water to chow down on a plant, the flies would hover in the air above him. Well, I paddled too close to the moose, and when his headed plunged under water, all those flies moved over and settled on me! No flies settled on Linda and the kids. I paddled frantically away, swatting at flies, but it took about 20 minutes to get rid of them all. That’s not a fond memory, it’s just a memory.

Paul Cyr is a professional photographer in Presque Isle who specializes in wildlife. I guarantee you will enjoy this book.

 

George Smith

About George Smith

George stepped down at the end of 2010 after 18 years as the executive director of the Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine to write full time. He writes a weekly editorial page column in the Kennebec Journal and Waterville Morning Sentinel, a weekly travel column in those same newspapers (with his wife Linda), monthly columns in The Maine Sportsman magazine, two outdoor news blogs (one on his website, georgesmithmaine.com, and one on the website of the Bangor Daily News), and special columns for many publications and newsletters. Islandport Press published a book of George's favorite columns, "A Life Lived Outdoors" in 2014. In 2014, George also won a Maine Press Association award for writing the state's bet sports blog. In 2016, Down East Books published George's book, Maine Sporting Camps, and Islandport Press published George and his wife Linda's travel book, Take It From ME, about their favorite Maine inns and restaurants.