FAIRBANKS, Alaska — The Alaska
Department of Fish and Game is postponing an aerial wolf control
program planned for two Interior villages because of too little snow to
track the animals, low light and legal issues.
The department had
planned aerial wolf control in November for Allakaket and Alatna, two
villages about 200 miles northwest of Fairbanks where residents report
that predators are killing too many moose. The date now has been pushed
to mid-to-late February.
State wildlife biologists were planning
to shoot as many as 50 wolves from helicopters in a 1,360-square-mile
area around the villages on the upper Koyukuk River, according to
Monday's Fairbanks Daily News-Miner ( http://is.gd/AfuqtC).
"Conditions
are not ideal for tracking; the light is fading every day; and the
legal issues we're dealing with still haven't been resolved," said Fish
and Game spokeswoman Cathie Harms.
The Alaska Board of Game
approved the move to eradicate wolves in game management unit 24B in
March. The program is intended to leave more moose for food for humans
by improving the survival rates of calf and yearling moose, Harms said.
The
plan called for department staff to eliminate all the wolves in the
area this year and shoot any new wolves that move into the area for four
consecutive years after that.
"Department staff would be aiming
to take 35 to 50 wolves in the first year and probably 15 to 20 every
year after that," Harms said. "We hope to have the whole program
finished by 2017."
The department estimates there are 25 to 50
wolves in the area, which is home to approximately 400 moose. The
control area represents about 10 percent of Unit 24B and the area is
accessible for hunters in the two villages.
ADF&G studies have
shown that bears, not wolves, are responsible for the highest mortality
of moose calves in the area. But local residents specifically asked the
department to focus on wolves rather than bears because bears represent
a commonly used alternative food source.
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