Twitching the white elks

The moose (used in North America) or elk (used in Eurasia) (Alces alces) is the world's tallest, largest and heaviest extant species of deer and the only species in the genus Alces. Elks are common here in Finland, but white elks - they are extremely rare!

Elks and White-tailed Deers (Odocoileus virginianus)

As I have seen almost all possible mammal species in Finland, I don't have nowadays many species left to twitch and add as ticks to my personal Finnish mammals list, I have started to twitch rare, exceptional looking mammals, like these white elks.

This year, a good friend of mine (who wants to stay anonyme), gave me a hint of these animals and I started a trip to other side of Finland with my son Roni. The exact location stays secret, as the landowner does not want his private road to be filled with nature photographers.

We arrived to site just in right time, when the elks walked from the forest to field. They began to eat grass and hay in peace and stayed there almost an hour. It was simply an amazing experience! 

I wonder what will be my next mammal experience in Finland, could it be the Eurasian Least Shrew (Sorex minutissimus), Arctic Fox (Vulpes lagopus) or albino Eurasian Red Squirrel (Sciurus vulgaris)? Who knows, I'm sure that something will come, but I have no idea what will it be and when.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Author

Olli Haukkovaara

email: olli.haukkovaara @ proton.me

Valkeakoski
Finland

Note! High Latitude Mammalwatcher blog has been rebuilt

Rebuilding of the blog

Due to fact that I have had three Gmail accounts, and wrote blog articles with all of them, I had to rebuilt the whole blog, because during autumn 2025, I'm going to get rid of cruzan @ gmail.com and ohaukkovaara @ gmail.com accounts. It means that I had to copy / paste all old articles to new ones, and assign my main Gmail account olli.haukkovaara @ gmail.com to author of all 13 articles. This means also that the statistics of this blog was reset. 

This means that I will also activate again in writing new blog articles during autumn 2025.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Author

Olli Haukkovaara

email: olli.haukkovaara @ proton.me

Valkeakoski
Finland

My Finland mammal life list

    

Updated: 13.9.2025

This is my life list of wild mammal species I have either seen, or heard here in Finland. 

Carnivorans (Carnivore)

1.      Raccoon Dog (Nyctereutes procyonoides ussuriensis)

2.      Red Fox (Vulpes vulpes)

3.      Eurasian Wolf (Canis lupus lupus)

4.      Feral Cat (Felis catus)

5.      Eurasian Lynx (Lynx lynx)

6.      Eurasian Otter (Lutra lutra)

7.     Wolverine (Gulo gulo)

8.      European Pine Martin (Martes martes)

9.      Eurasian Badger (Meles meles)

10.     Stoat (Mustela erminea)

11.    Weasel (Mustela nivalis)

12.    European Polecat (Mustela putorius)

13.    American Mink (Mustela vison)

14.    Grey Seal (Halichoerus grypus)

15.    Baltic Ringed Seal (Pusa hispida botnica)

16.    Saimaa Ringed Seal (Pusa saimensis)

17.    Walrus (Odobenus rosmarus)

18.    Brown Bear aka Grizzly Bear (Ursus arctos)

Even-toed ungulates (Cetartiodactyla)

19.    Mouflon aka Red Sheep (Ovis orientalis)

20.    Moose aka Eurasian Elk (Alces alces)

21.    Finnish forest reindeer (Rangifer tarandus fennicus) 

22.    European Roe Deer (Capreolus capreolus)

23.    Fallow Deer (Dama dama)

24.    White-tailed Deer (Odocoileus virginianus)

25.    Wild Boar (Sus scrofa)

Bats (Chiroptera)

26.    Northern Bat (Eptesicus nilssonii)

27.    Brandt's Bat (Myotis brandtii)

28.    Whiskered Bat (Myotis mystacinus)

29.    Daubenton's Bat (Myotis daubentonii)

30.    Natterer's Bat (Myotis nattereri)

31.    Pond Bat (Myotis dasycneme)

32.    Noctule (Nyctalus noctula)

33.    Nathusius' Pipistrelle (Pipistrellus nathusii)

34.    Brown Long-eared Bat (Plecotus auritus)

Eulipotyphla (Eulipotyphla)

35. Western European Hedgehog (Erinaceus europaeus)

36. European Mole (Talpa europaea)

37. Eurasian Water Shrew (Neomys fodiens)

38. Eurasian Shrew (Sorex araneus)

39. Laxmann's Shrew (Sorex caecutiens)

40. Taiga Shrew (Sorex isodon)

41. Pygmy Shrew (Sorex minutus)

Lagomorphs (Lagomorpha)

42. European Brown Hare (Lepus europaeus)

43. Arctic Hare aka Mountain Hare (Lepus timidus)

44. European Rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus)

Rodents (Rodentia)

45. American Beaver (Castor canadensis)

46. Eurasian Beaver (Castor fiber)

47. Eurasian Water Vole (Arvicola terrestris)

48. Field Vole (Microtus agrestis)

49. Sibling Vole (Microtus rossiaemeridionalis)

50. Tundra Vole (Microtus oeconomus)

51. Bank Vole (Clethrionomys glareolus)

52. Grey-sided Vole (Clethrionomys rufocanus)

53. Red Vole (Clethrionomys rutilus)

54. Wood Lemming (Myopus schisticolor)

55. Norwegian lemming (Lemmus lemmus)

56. Muskrat (Ondatra zibethicus)

57. Northern Birch Mouse (Sicista betulina)

58. Striped Field Mouse (Apodemus agrarius)

59. Yellow-necked Field Mouse (Apodemus flavicollis)

60. Eurasian Harvest Mouse (Micromys minutus)

61. House Mouse (Mus musculus)

62. Brown Rat (Rattus norvegicus)

63. Siberian Flying Squirrel (Pteromys volans)

64. Eurasian Red Squirrel (Sciurus vulgaris)

Cetaceans (Cetacea)

65. Common Bottlenose Dolphin (Tursiops truncatus)

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Author

Olli Haukkovaara

email: olli.haukkovaara @ proton.me

Valkeakoski
Finland