Minnesota DNR - Mortality Among Moose In Study 21% Since 2002 - #s Cannot Self-Sustain

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In August, Minnesota's Moose Advisory Committee called on the state to do more to preserve and develop moose habitat, including ensuring adequate food supplies, providing shade in the summer and reducing parasites. The committee also recommended managing hunting to hold down the number of deer and limit the spread of parasites from deer to moose. The panel didn't recommend changes in moose hunting rules, which award permits via a lottery and limit hunters to just one moose hunt in their lifetime. The number of moose killed by hunters is too small to affect the population much, the panel said.

Panel chairman Rolf Peterson, a moose researcher from Michigan Technical University, said colder weather during the past two years has been good for northern Minnesota moose but the population hasn't measurably improved.

Mortality rates in radio-collared moose are too high to sustain the population, Peterson said. Research by Minnesota's Department of Natural Resources put the average non-hunting mortality among collared moose at 21 percent since 2002.

"Those moose are not doing well, and they're dying of health-related reasons," Peterson said. "They're exposed to a lot of pathogens, and it's not clear what they're dying from."


Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/28/minnesota-moose-stressed-_n_301651.html

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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/28/minnesota-moose-stressed-_n_301651.html