Oil worker says he saved baby moose from a bear in Canada — and it got him fired
An oil worker says he’s out of a job after trying to save a baby moose from a bear while he was working in Canada.
The worker, Mark Skage, said in a detailed post on Facebook that he was heading back into town when he encountered the calf along the highway — and then noticed a black bear about 50 yards away “just waitin’.”
Skage said the calf kept trying to climb into the truck.
“I couldn’t just leave her there,” he said in the July 4 post. “So I stuck her in the passenger side and drove to town to get her some help.”
Skage, who CBC reports is from Fort Nelson in British Columbia, said he gave his supervisor a heads up and talked with wildlife conservation services before he found her a place to stay until he could figure out a more permanent spot for the calf. Meanwhile, he started calling her Misty.
“A few days later Misty (that’s what I called her) got a ride to a rehab centre a little farther south where they will let her grow up a bit before releasin’ her back into the wild,” Skage said on Facebook.
But his rescue efforts cost him his job at AFD Petroleum, he said.
AFD Petroleum President Dale Reimer told McClatchy News in an emailed statement on July 17 that Skage was “ultimately terminated due to a series of workplace incidents culminating with this incident.”
“AFD Petroleum has thorough human resources policies and procedures in place, in addition to protocols surrounding interactions with wildlife. Employees are required to undergo training on these policies regardless of previous experience,” Reimer said in the statement.
Reimer said Skage would have known about the policies.
“After carefully reviewing the two-way video footage captured by the employee’s work vehicle, it is clear that the employee was in direct violation of those wildlife policies,” Reimer said.
In a similar statement on Facebook, company officials said they were “aware of a video circulating online depicting the conduct of a former employee toward a wild moose calf.” Company officials said they were “deeply disappointed” that the matter had gotten so much attention from the public.
“We take our obligation to wildlife and to our natural environment extremely seriously,” the post says. “Not only did this former employee put himself and other road users at risk by capturing and transporting an uninjured wild animal in his company vehicle for many hours but he also caused distress and potential harm to the moose, having failed to contact conservation authorities immediately as required.”
Skage had posted several photos of the calf inside his company vehicle and a video of the calf approaching the truck.
“Hey buddy. Where’s mom? Where’d momma go?” he asks as the calf walks up to the truck. “What am I gonna do for you? Where’s mom? You can’t just be out here all by yourself.”
The company found during its investigation that the two-way video from Skage’s company vehicle “shows no evidence of a bear nearby” and seems to show that Skage did not seem to search for the calf’s mother — “his decision to capture the moose calf was made in two minutes or less,” the statement says.
“There is also no other vehicle traffic which could have posed a threat to the animal, which he placed in the front seat of his company vehicle for five hours and drove several hundred kilometers to a friend’s property,” the statement says. “The employee’s conduct demonstrates he understood he was acting inappropriately.”
Ultimately, Skage said he did what he “felt was the right thing.”
“Did I do all the right things. Did I say all the right stuff likely not,” he said “…But I do know that whatever anyone else thinks the calf’s mom was not there. The bear was.”
Several people in the comments praised Skage’s compassion and said they would have done the same thing.
But wildlife officials warn that even though it’s hard, interfering can do more harm than good. It can habituate wild animals to humans and put them in harm’s way.
At the end of May, a man tried to help a baby bison that was separated from its herd while crossing a river in Yellowstone National Park, McClatchy News previously reported.
Even though he was trying to help, the calf could not be reunited with the herd, and wildlife officials had to euthanize it because it was creating a hazard by wandering along the road, walking up to cars and following people.
Then over Memorial Day weekend, tourists grabbed a baby elk in Yellowstone National Park, put it inside their car and drove to a police station, McClatchy News reported.
And while they may have thought they were helping an abandoned calf, its mother might not have been far.
Elk mothers will often leave their calves bedded and hidden in grass while they forage or graze. So it’s likely the tourist separated the calf from its mother permanently, eliminating any chance of them being reunited.
This story was originally published July 17, 2023 at 3:32 PM with the headline "Oil worker says he saved baby moose from a bear in Canada — and it got him fired."
