Report: Moose may decline faster than originally thought

Minnesota’s stressed moose population could all but disappear within a decade, much faster than previously estimated, if the current rate of decline continues.

That’s the projection noted by several natural resource experts who were part of the state’s 2009 Moose Advisory Committee to develop ways to save the state’s iconic forest animals.

The report states that if the decline over the past six years continues at the same rate, there could be few moose in Northeastern Minnesota by the year 2020. The report was submitted Monday to Minnesota Department of Natural Resources Commissioner Tom Landwehr.

While that rapid moose decline could slow, offering more time to solve the moose mystery, the researchers offered the report to the DNR as an updated recommendation because “rapidly changing conditions require attention.”

When the advisory panel first met it was believed moose would likely continue in northeastern Minnesota, in fewer numbers, for the next 50 years or more. The latest opinion casts doubt on that timeline.

While the praised the DNR for research efforts already under way and for taking action to reduce moose hunting permits, they also urged a stronger, more public campaign to draw attention to the problem.

Ron Moen, a moose researcher at the Natural Resources Research Institute of the University of Minnesota Duluth told the Duluth News Tribune, “We’re not trying to create a controversy here. Everyone involved is working to solve this for moose.” It was Moen who projected the rate of decline over the past six years into the future and found moose mostly gone from Minnesota sometime between 2021 and 2025.

Earlier this month, the DNR released its moose management plan based on the earlier recommendations, two years in the making, which aims to check the moose decline in northeastern Minnesota. The plan calls for limiting and even ending moose hunting as their numbers dwindle; additional research into why moose are dying; limiting deer numbers in moose areas to avoid spreading disease, making recreational deer feeding in the moose range illegal and habitat projects to give moose more of what they need to eat and escape summer heat.

In northeastern Minnesota, moose numbers plummeted to about 4,900 animals during the 2011 winter survey – down 11 percent from 2010 and down from more than 8,000 just five years ago.