Cliff Notes – Everything we know about the moose-obsessed TV show loved by 9,000,000 people
- The Great Moose Migration, also known as The Great Elk Trek, is a peaceful reality tv show featuring the annual migration of Sweden’s moose, attracting millions of viewers.
- The show was rescheduled to air a week earlier due to warmer weather accelerating the migration, with a three-week livestream expected to draw significant audience engagement.
- The production involves a 15-person crew and extensive camera setups, highlighting the growing popularity of ‘slow TV’ that captures natural events in real time.
Everything we know about the moose-obsessed TV show loved by 9,000,000 people
When you think of reality TV shows, images of screaming matches in Vanderpump Rules, cheating husbands in Married at First Sight, or Big Brother chaos are conjured. But there is a much more peaceful alternative, and it’s airing right now.
Introducing the least dramatic reality TV show in the world: The Great Moose Migration – officially known as The Great Elk Trek, or as the Swedish call it, Den stora älgvandringen.
While it was due to air on April 22, STV’s The Great Elk Trek has been forced forward by a week to accommodate the warmer Swedish climate, which has sped up the annual moose migration.
That’s right, some of Sweden’s 300,000 moose are about to unknowingly cross rivers, poop, and chomp on some tasty grass in front of millions of people.
As we speak, patches of snow still cling to the shores of the Ångerman River in northern Sweden, visible on the three-week livestream which was watched by 9,000,000 people last spring.
The moose migration live stream attracted 9,000,000 viewers in 2024
It’s kicked off early this year as warmer weather have sped up the migration. Geese can be heard in the background as the water laps and flows, with viewers waiting patiently for the first moose to enter the shot on its annual migration across the river – a moment everyone wants to see.
‘There are a lot of moose about,’ the producer, Stefan Edlund, told SVT. ‘They’re waiting for us. We’ve had to adjust. But it should be OK.’
It’s not just a few cameras left to their own devices (literally), but The Great Elk Trek has a 15-person crew who are working out of an Umeå control room, 400 miles north of Stockholm.
How to watch The Great Moose Migration and similar slow TV shows?
The Great Moose Migration airs on STV, and is available to watch through this link. It is on every day and night for three weeks.
Closer to home, you can watch a series of live wildlife streams via the Wildlife Trust’s website – from Nottingham’s peregrine falcons to Skomer puffins, Somerset barn owls, Montgomeryshire’s ospreys, kittiwakes in Durham, and even Cardigan Bay dolphins.
As the elk have plodded the same route for thousands of years – much like the Serengeti National Park’s Great Wildebeest Migration – the crew had luckily already positioned the 12 miles of cable and 26 cameras ready to capture the action.
Though, most of the time, not much happens.
This ‘slow TV’ trend began when Norway’s public broadcaster NRK aired the minute-by-minute progress of a seven-hour train trip. Now its spread to global and viral heights, with the Fish Doorbell the best-known channel right now.
Sweden is home to some 300,000 moose, who roam the forests
The viral Fish Doorbell in Utrecht allows viewers to spot fish trying to migrate through the lock streams.
When eagle-eyed viewers see a fish, they press a virtual doorbell, and once enough are spotted, the lock operators open the gate to let them carry on their migratory route.
Fans are obsessed with The Great Moose Migration
‘I think it’s a genre that’s going to stay with us,’ Annette Hill, professor of media at Jönköping University, told the Associated Press.
‘I think that its appeal to something natural and authentic taking place, which we can witness minute by minute, in real time, is very powerful.’
This is the action shot everyone is tuning in to witness
Ulla Malmgren, 62, doesn’t want to miss a moment of the 20-day, 24-hour event, so she stocked up on snacks and those close to her know not to bother her when it’s happening.
‘Sleep? Forget it. I don’t sleep,’ she said. ‘I make sure I have coffee, I have snacks.’
Fellow moose enthusiast William Garp Liljefors was late to school due to the live stream.
‘I was late to school because I saw moose and my teacher was like, “What, you saw moose in the city?” And I was like, “No, it’s on the TV,”‘ he said.