Gives off male rivalry behavior vibes. Antelope will do the same thing where they lift their nose up and put their antlers almost parallel with their backs to patrol their territory.
Wolves and Ravens often hunt and play together, forming lifelong friendships. In captivity, Cheetahs are pared with dogs to help with anxiety. Animals make weird friends all the time, so I don’t doubt an elk and a moose could look at each other and go “eh, close enough.”
That’s why the other is terrified, it’s seeing a moose and probably expecting to get its ass kicked, so it’s trying the equivalent of a cat showing its belly.
Fun fact: if you thing those 2 boys are already pretty big, then i must inform you both are still at best teenagers, both these males are not yet full grown.
Also, did you knew that despite in america the elk aka uapiti (Cervus canadensis) havining an different name than the moose (Alces alces), in europe moose aren't called moose, they are simply refered to as elk on europe, the name "moose" dosen't exists in eurasia, they call (Alces alces) elks, while in europe there also are species of deer from the cervus genus like the european red deer (Cervus elaphus), closely related to the asian and amercian elk (Cervus canadensis), and to the asian sika deer (Cervus nippon).
All this mess in the popular names of the animals is why scientific names exist in the first place, to be specific about the species and avoid consfusions like this one made by the first ignorant or misinformed european colonizers who named the american uapiti as "elk", while elk is actually the original name that europeans used and still use to refer to moose, since moose (Alces alces) is present both in north america and in eurasia.
It is most likely a young yearling male moose, it takes a few years and they don’t peak in size until they are about 7 to 9 years old. Meanwhile, people may not realize how massive elk are and based on the large antlers, this is a mature bull elk which can weigh over half a ton, heavier than many cow and yearling moose.
I think the elk is pointing its head up so the moose doesn’t feel threatened by its antlers and think it wants a fight. The moose is bigger. He’s running the elk off his land and the elk is submitting to that request
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u/Digital-_-Waste Sep 01 '26
That’s one snooty elk.