Sumarokovo Moose Farm near Kostroma

Kostroma moose farm tickets and opening hours

Entry is 300 ₽ for adults and 200 ₽ for children from four, school pupils, students, pensioners and people with disabilities. Under-fours go free. The ticket covers a guided tour and a bag of washed, chopped carrots to feed the moose; photos and video cost nothing extra.

The farm is open every day of the year, 10:00–15:00, and until 13:00 on 31 December. You can’t wander around on your own: if you turn up independently you join the next group, or staff put together a new one — sometimes you wait for a free guide. Only groups of more than 20 need to book.

Tours are in Russian and the farm staff speak only Russian. Even without the commentary, the moose are the show — but a guided trip from Kostroma with an English-speaking guide makes the visit much easier.

What is the Sumarokovo Moose Farm?

It’s a working research farm that has spent more than sixty years trying to turn the moose into a domestic animal. It was founded in 1963 under the Kostroma agricultural research station and now belongs to a regional body, the Sumarokovsky state nature reserve. Cows are milked, calves are bottle-raised, and adults wear GPS collars.

What makes it different from a zoo is semi-free keeping. The moose spend most of their lives in the reserve’s forest and come to the farm by choice — for oat porridge, for milking, for the feeders. So you might meet a full-grown cow in the car park, or not see one at all, depending on the season and the weather.

Visitors watch moose of different ages through the fence and feed them the guide’s carrots. In summer and autumn you can step into the pen with this year’s calves. It’s not a petting zoo with guaranteed cuddles — it’s a real farm with its own rules, and that is exactly why YesGo rates it.

When to see moose calves, season by season

• Late April – May: calves are born. You see them only through a double fence while they are in quarantine; the May holidays are the busiest days.
• From early June: calves spend the day in a pen that visitors may enter and photograph. Touching and hugging them is allowed only from August–September, and only when the farm is quiet.
• Summer: adult cows head into the forest after milking and rarely appear. Young two- and three-year-olds are kept by the entrance — they’re the ones you feed.
• June – September: fresh moose milk — a small tasting portion after the tour.
• Winter: many adult cows come to the calving pen for aspen bark, and you can feed them carrots through the fence.
• All year: the milking stalls, the GPS collars and the story of how a moose is tamed from its first days.

Can you drink moose milk at the farm?

Yes, in season. The cows are milked twice a day; the milk has been certified since 2009 and mostly goes to the nearby Ivan Susanin sanatorium, which treats stomach conditions. It’s over 10 % fat and over 8 % protein — thick, and nothing like cow’s milk.

After the tour you can buy a small tasting portion; fresh milk is available from June to September. A whole litre costs 2,000 ₽ and has to be ordered in advance. The two farm websites quote different tasting sizes and prices, so check on the spot.

A short history of moose farming in Russia

The Soviet idea of taming the moose dates from the 1940s: in 1949 the first experimental moose farm opened in the Pechora-Ilych reserve in the Komi Republic. The Kostroma farm was set up in 1963 on its experience. The first calves were taken from local forests, five adults arrived from Pechora in 1968, and the farm’s own first calf was born in May 1970.

Its heyday was the 1970s and 1980s — 67 moose in 1978, 16 cows in milk in 1985. Hunting on the land was banned in 1991 and the reserve grew to around 36,000 hectares. The Kostroma farm is still going.

Is the Kostroma moose farm worth it?

Worth it if you’re in Kostroma with children, or for two days or more. Standing a few steps from a living moose is something no museum in town can give you, and the round trip with a tour fits into half a day.

With only one day, YesGo says stay in the centre — the Ipatiev Monastery and the old trading rows give you more. And don’t expect a petting zoo: in summer the adult cows may be out in the forest, calves can’t be touched until August, and after 15:00 there is little to see.

Moose farm vs Ipatiev Monastery vs Kostromskaya Sloboda

The monastery and the Sloboda sit side by side and pair easily into one day in town. The moose farm is a half-day trip of its own: moose in the morning, the centre after lunch.

How to do it right

• The best hour is 10:00: the moose are by the pens after their morning porridge, guides are free, crowds are thin.
• Half a day: taxi for 10:00 → tour and milk tasting → back for lunch on Susanin Square.
• With kids, pair the farm with the Snow Maiden’s Terem — together they make Kostroma’s best family day.
• If no adult moose come to the fence, don’t be disappointed: in summer they graze in the forest and come back only for milking.
• Calves under a year old are never fed anything — not even carrots or branches from their own feeder.
• Flash photography is fine — moose don’t react to it — but laser pointers and UV torches are banned.

Questions