And no, they’re not banning the huge beasts from taking self-portraits. Although you’d think it unnecessary, the warning is for humans not to bother the elk who occasionally wander into Stockholm’s parks and streets.
Displaced by climate change and shrinking habitat, the huge animals have increasingly wandered into the wrong places, officials say, but if they are left to their own devices, they usually find their way home, just like Little Bo-Peep’s errant sheep.
“An elk that has got lost can usually find its way back if it is calm. But when people run up and take pictures, it becomes stressed and aggressive. It is utterly misanthropic and it’s outrageous that people do not understand better,” an officer for the National Game Accident Council told a local newspaper.
“Game wardens have agreed that there is nothing wrong with the elk in the city. However, they get very stressed because there are so many people trying to take pictures. That’s why we have to kill the elk, because of Stockholmers who think the animal world looks like a Walt Disney movie.”
