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As you probably saw from my first guest post, Canada is an amazing, diverse land.  But what about its wildlife?  What does that look like?  Well, I don’t have any of the stereotypical polar bear pictures, but here are some pictures of wildlife from my area.

Wood Bison

Most people would call this a ‘buffalo.’  I know I did when I first saw it.  But it’s technically a bison, a Wood Bison to be more precise.  The Wikipedia article about it says that it’s a subspecies of the American Bison.  That’s about as much as I know about it except for the one fact that really sticks out in my mind.  My father and I were stopped in a British Columbia restaurant and I read a poster that said 250 Wood Bison are hit by cars every single year.  And did you know that they’re still a threatened species?

White-Tailed Deer Fawn

Of course what picture collection is complete without its mandatory “Aw!” picture.  In case you didn’t guess, this is a white-tailed deer fawn.  When their mothers go out looking for food, they’re supposed to stay absolutely still so they can blend in and hide from predators.  I barely had to use the zoom feature on my camera to take this picture because the poor thing was absolutely still.  If I had wanted to, I could have petted it, but that would have been cruel as it seemed to be trembling with fright.  So I got my picture and got out of there.

Caribou

No photo essay about Canada is complete without a picture of a caribou.  This isn’t a particularly large or old one, but its antlers are pretty impressive when you get up close.  Unfortunately, caribou in British Columbia and the Yukon are fond of grazing on the side of the busy roads, and you know what happens then.

Seals

You can’t really visit the Maritimes without going for at least one whale-watching expedition.  On the expedition I took, we didn’t see many whales, but there were plenty of seals!  I think they like staring at the ships that come by.  It gives them something different to look at from time to time.  Although the picture doesn’t really show it, their gaze can be quite unnerving because they look right at you.

Turkey Vulture

Here in Saskatchewan, we have a lot of birds because we’re on a migratory bird path.  But one of the constant birds is the Turkey Vulture.  Related to the Old World vultures, but not as ugly, they too are scavengers.  Yet there’s something magnificent about the way they hold themselves; they have a certain pride in their bearing.

Well, that’s just a sample of the many animals we have here in Canada, but I hope it was enough to show you that our animals do match our landscape.  Thanks for reading!

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