Major Moose Study Underway
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Cow and calf moose munch on kale in Prince George garden last fall – photo 250News archive
Prince George, B.C. A comprehensive five-year moose study that will investigate recent moose population declines in B.C.'s Interior is now underway.
In the fall of 2012, it was revealed the moose population in the Prince George-Omineca region had declined by as much as 50%. Study spokesperson biologist Doug Heard, says its believed the situation hasn’t changed since the fall of 2012, “there hasn’t been any study done to confirm current densities, although we have continued to monitor calf survival ratios and they haven’t changed much.”
The study will help to answer why the populations dropped and what can be done to revive the numbers.
(at right, 5 different areas that will be examined as part of this study – photo courtesy Ministry Forest Lands Natural Resource Operations)
There will be eleven wildlife biologists, one veterinarian and several other staff working on the project which will see more than 200 cow moose collared and tracked. So far, about 60 cows have been collared.
All moose deaths will be investigated to determine why the animal died.
The study will look at five different areas of the province, and may include another three as work progresses.
Factors that will be examined include:
- hunting pressure,
- predators,
- parasites and diseases
- climate
- forestry activity
Anecdotal information has pointed to the use of ATV’s allows hunters access to areas previously out of their range. Heard says if that were the case, then the number of harvested moose should be up, and that number really hasn’t changed.
There have been suggestions wolves are taking down too many moose. Again, Heard says while hunters are telling biologists they are seeing more wolves, there is no evidence to support that theory.
Nor is there evidence to support the theory that ticks are responsible.
As for the increased forestry activity, that’s a tough one, as the increased forestry activity has been largely in beetle kill stands, and but the increased mortality rate is not being experienced in some areas where there has been extensive logging.
The study’s final results are years away, however, preliminary information will be used to help shape moose management plans throughout BC.
Comments
I can’t quite make out the areas on the map – can anyone with younger eyes help?
Here you go jales4:
http://www.newsroom.gov.bc.ca/downloads/Provincial_moose_monitoring_areas_January_22_14.pdf
They’re sure screening posters these days. Any how, my guess would be all the dead pine forest is affecting them somehow. I think predators are getting at them. Coyotes seem more aggressive these days. It’ll be interesting to find out what’s hurting the population
Screening posters?
Some of the comments relating to scary Shari have been taken off
I wonder how on depth the hunting pressure section is going to be. Are they going to look at what demographic takes the most animals out of a given area, and when it comes to aboriginal hunts, they wouldn’t even know how many per year are killed. Are they going to look at how quads have affected how people access areas. And are they going to look into how many are slaughtered on railway tracks, etc?
Study, study, study when will it end. Maybe if they becme more involved during open season would give them a clue.
Cheers
Agree with “Huh” that in this study they need to check how many moose are killed along the railways. So far this winter I have heard from the border to Prince George were now well over 300 moose that have been killed along this corridor. In addition CN staff that travel this corridor say they see large wolf packs thriving on the dead moose.
We hunt in 7-11 and you use to see lots of moose and hardly any wolf sign now you see hardly any moose and lots of wolf sign. No study needed just eliminate the calf season and control the wolves.
This all started after some Judge gave status Natives the right to pit lamp. I haven’t figured out how a Judge has that authority but no one else seems to care.
I believe this to be a BIG factor in decline of moose population throughout the province. I have no idea why this practice has been accepted by the hunting community – it certainly should not be legal for ANYONE.
I can honestly say this: If I was a status Native and had that right, I would use it and I wouldn’t report the kill either.
Saw about 30 moose this fall. Quite a bit more than i normally see for that time of year. Anyway having said that I’m not making a case against the study but looking forward to the results..
Are you kidding me, You dont need a study to figure out killing calfs, killing cows and CN rail are the biggest threat to our moose population. They used to publish how many moose were being hit by CN RAIL.I talked to one CN conductor that said they plowed right throuhg a herd of 7 moose 1 winter and only 2 got off the tracks in time.They kill thosands of animals every winter.
Great to have a study to find out why the numbers are down, better yet would be a moratorium on cow and calf season until they figure it out.
About 12,900 years ago Earth was hit by an comet as represented in geological terms by a layer of nanodiamonds in the sediment at the beginning of the Youger Dryas (or big freeze 12,900-11,500 years ago)… this brought a rapid return to glacial conditions. It also began the rapid decline and extinction of a lot of North America’s big mammals like the woolly mammoth, saber tooth tiger, woolly rhino’s and even horses, to say nothing of the Clovis (the first peoples to populate North America).
The CBC reports today that the arctic was not once the gassy wasteland we envision it to be, but rather had many nutritious forbs type plants or plants of the types that humans commonly eat today. Plants with enough nutrition to provide the needs to the biggest mammals in Earths history. These parts and throughout the North had a different environment back then, which was much drier and compatible with those types of plants.
That all changed with the last ice age and the wet swampy conditions that followed as those plants species went extinct in the arctic and a more woody plant took hold. As the more woody plants took over the environment it enabled moose, elk, and caribou to take over. They attribute this change of species directly to the effects of climate change… in this case a cooling planet.
In our case we had the pine beetle epidemic that no doubt is still in the process of changing the species make up of our forests, and we and the moose might be the Clovis and woolly mammoth of times gone past… for all we know this could mark their return. Just another iteration of mother nature. For all we know CN Rail trains and wolves that travel our highways and rail lines in the winter months when the snow is deep are also part of this same process, and in our case we humans are the comet of our times?
Doneright wrote: “They used to publish how many moose were being hit by CN RAIL”
I recall those days as well.
I was looking up the digitized papers and found this as an example from the front page of an Aug 1975 paper which spoke about the impact a steel mill would have on the moose population.
Dave King was being quoted as saying that between 500 and 1,000 mooses are killed every year on the line between Smithers and Tete Jaune and that hunters take about 6,000.
Wonder if we could get an update some 40 years later. Almost does not sound like the study will attempt that.
I’ve hunted for almost 50 years. I’ve been saying moose have been slowly droping in numbers for 25 years or so. 1980 or 81 I think LEH started. And the calf season. Down hill ever since.
Eagle says…”to say nothing of the Clovis (the first peoples to populate North America)”
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From Wikipedia.
“According to the standard accepted theory, the Clovis people crossed the Beringia land bridge over the Bering Strait from Siberia to Alaska during the period of lowered sea levels during the ice age, then made their way southward through an ice-free corridor east of the Rocky Mountains in present-day western Canada as the glaciers retreated. This hypothesis came to be challenged by studies suggesting a Pre-Clovis Human occupation of the Americas[20] until in 2011, following the excavation of an occupation site at Buttermilk Creek, Texas, a prominent group of scientists claimed to have definitely established the existence “of an occupation older than Clovis”
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