Washington moose Gov tag 2018

[jackelope]

Ticks and wolves are putting the hurt on our moose too.

[KFhunter]

I don't consider moose to be an entry level youth type animal, especially being an OIL species tag.  They're OIL because they're limited in numbers enough that only a hand full can be taken each year, so it doesn't make since to kill the breeders with a youth tag unless the carrying capacity of the land has been reached or exceeded, which isn't the case.

Always /baffled me.  Although I do put my kids in for it.

[bearpaw]

I live in moose central, my guides and I spend a bunch of time in many of the moose units hunting all the different species, we often hunt almost every day of all the various spring and fall seasons. Being out there that much gives us a feel for game numbers based on what we see. There are moose units where I used to expect to see 5 to 20+ moose per day, every day, no matter what time of year, if I spent a full day in the best moose country in that unit.

Over the last few years I've been griping that moose were declining, more and more hunters have been agreeing, and finally I noticed that WDFW says they expect moose to peak soon. HHHHMMMMMM...  

As usual WDFW is way late to the party because all the bios have been busy trying to find wolf packs, counting eagles, and looking for lynx and fisher tracks! 

How bad is it? I am a full time outfitter, we make a living by booking hunters for hunts, but I declined several moose hunters last fall because they drew tags in moose units where I did not feel we had good odds of finding them one bull in 5 days of hunting. I don't want to be the outfitter who couldn't find someone a moose. In several of the moose units I would say the moose are down to 25% or less of the population that used to exist in the same unit, I am basing that on the fact that I can spend a full day and sometimes several days in those units in areas where I used to see multiple moose per day and now I do not see any moose for a few days. Roads that used to be full of moose tracks now have a moose track here and there. In the spring in soft soil you see the tracks of every critter that has passed since the last heavy rain, now I often see more wolf, coyote, bear, and cougar tracks than moose tracks and even deer tracks are not in abundance in some areas.

A while back I read that WDFW found that cougar were eating wolves, they had roughly 20 or 30 wolves collared and found that 2 were killed by cougar. Two things come to mind, first we must have a lot of cougar, second those cougar are eating what they encounter in their haunts. It's pretty obvious to me that if cougar are eating that percentage of wolves that's an indicator of the high number of cougar and that they are frequently coming into contact with wolves. Could this mean an over abundance of cougar and wolves? 

Before I get bombarded with the comments about ticks and disease let me say I understand those are big factors too. Even in areas with few wolves moose numbers have declined. F&G Dept's across the nation have found declines in moose herds. But, it's the areas where wolf numbers are high that have suffered the biggest moose declines, (think NE MN, central Idaho, NW WY, and now NE WA), those areas are experiencing a double whammy of impacts on the moose herd! I would expect high cougar populations aren't helping moose either, a hungry cougar has to feed itself.

My main point is that we don't have the same moose herds we had 5 or more years ago, we need to save the breeders, the females. Since WDFW refuses to control predators and they haven't figured a way to control disease and ticks, the only option available to slow the decline of our moose herd is to not shoot the cows that make more moose! Rant Over!

[Skyvalhunter]

Well Dale I am glad you made your comments to the WDFW about the proposed changes then.

[bearpaw]

If I didn't feel we need to do something about the moose I wouldn't say anything, after all I make a living by selling hunts, more tag holders means more business. But when there aren't enough moose to find a bull in 5 days something is wrong and needs fixed. There are still a couple units that moose numbers are still very strong, but each year the last few years even those units seem to be declining.

[KFhunter]

whens the last time you seen a calf in higher elevations?  Last moose calf I seen was down low by hunters wa, and that's been a while.   In moose areas where wolves are I haven't seen a calf in a long time.   I find dry cows and a bull once in a while, but no calves.

[bearpaw]

whens the last time you seen a calf in higher elevations?  Last moose calf I seen was down low by hunters wa, and that's been a while.   In moose areas where wolves are I haven't seen a calf in a long time.   I find dry cows and a bull once in a while, but no calves.

We hunted some WA areas where we saw good calf survival. We hunted Selkirk and I think we saw 15 cows and only 2 calves, the areas active with wolves certainly show the difference. Did see one good shooter bull but didn't get on him quick enough and he got away. Had to settle for a young bull the last day that i would have never let a hunter shoot 5 or 10 years ago, the hunter needed to leave for home so he wanted the small bull we had passed at least twice before.

I sold maps to two hunters who found good bulls in Selkirk, I'm not sure exactly how many days they hunted. I've been telling guys to hunt a week early and try to save another week of vacation for a return hunt if needed. That used to be one of my favorite units, before the downturn in the moose population it was rare to hunt there more than 3 days for a good bull.

All the northern units have taken hard hits from wolves, I'm sure you knew that!

[jackelope]

whens the last time you seen a calf in higher elevations?  Last moose calf I seen was down low by hunters wa, and that's been a while.   In moose areas where wolves are I haven't seen a calf in a long time.   I find dry cows and a bull once in a while, but no calves.

I saw a yearling calf 2 years ago turkey hunting up in the higher elevations in 49 not too far from Dale's place.
 

[hunterofelk]

So I am even more against allowing the governor's tag holder access to units not open for the general permits. Looks even more sketchy.

[KFhunter]

whens the last time you seen a calf in higher elevations?  Last moose calf I seen was down low by hunters wa, and that's been a while.   In moose areas where wolves are I haven't seen a calf in a long time.   I find dry cows and a bull once in a while, but no calves.

I saw a yearling calf 2 years ago turkey hunting up in the higher elevations in 49 not too far from Dale's place.

I wonder if it's still there 

[millerwheeler]

Besides the fact of being able to hunt all over it's also a tax  write off for the winning bidder which in some.cases is a very very big deal for them

[Jpmiller]

Besides the fact of being able to hunt all over it's also a tax  write off for the winning bidder which in some.cases is a very very big deal for them

Are you sure? I don't know all the details but I know if you receive something in return for a "donation" it makes it alot more difficult to write it off.

[millerwheeler]

Besides the fact of being able to hunt all over it's also a tax  write off for the winning bidder which in some.cases is a very very big deal for them

Are you sure? I don't know all the details but I know if you receive something in return for a "donation" it makes it alot more difficult to write it off.

Yes I'm sure it's all in verbage and how they classify  the "donation" or "charitable contribution "  many stated have them  big issue is  does the money really go fully the things there supposed to benefit. 

[millerwheeler]

Besides the fact of being able to hunt all over it's also a tax  write off for the winning bidder which in some.cases is a very very big deal for them

Are you sure? I don't know all the details but I know if you receive something in return for a "donation" it makes it alot more difficult to write it off.

Yes I'm sure it's all in verbage and how they classify  the "donation" or "charitable contribution "  many stated have them  big issue is  does the money really go fully the things there supposed to benefit.

 Here is a way I have always come.to.understand it
Let's say you win an auction at the Sheep show for an outfitted Dall Sheep hunt in the NWT. If you pay 20,000.00 and the hunt normally sells for 19,900.00, then you only have a 100.00 charitable donation.

OTOH, if you were to buy the Utah statewide sheep tag at that same auction for let's say 80,000. Then after deducting the 1518.00 that a NR sheep tag costs in the Utah draw, you're left with a total charitable donation of 78,482.00.

This is of course a huge factor in helping drive up the price for those type of tags. Guys are getting back 30-something percent of their bid price, come federal tax time the next year.

[Whitpirate]

Again, the rich hunter gets the privilege.  Sorry to be cynical, I think some animals should be able off limits if the average hunter can't hunt them.  In the fall of 2015, in the area we deer hunt, we saw many moose.   We called it the year of the moose.  Maybe so many moved in because of some wildfires that late summer.  I don't know if it is the same one from grundy53 avatar, but one big, old bull was very visible to just about everyone hunting there.  Big for a shiras.  My guess word got out and next bidder had to kill it so a little nudging and a little dangling of dollars and those units where opened.
I was at an auction in Bellevue and the moose tag was on the list.  Someone said it wouldn't go for much because the dollar amount for successful bid could get you a moose hunt in Canada or Alaska where an average mature bull is bigger.

I know the guy who worked to get those units opened up. I will tell you with 100% certainty that it had nothing to do with money. Had everything to do with more hunter opportunity. The auction money goes to the species so the moose populations in WA will benefit from the money these auctions raise.
In terms of moose here vs. Canada or Alaska, I'm not sure what you heard was accurate either. That or the person saying it maybe wasn't too familiar with moose. You're talking about 2 different subspecies of moose. It's like saying you shouldn't hunt Coues whitetails because there are huge whitetail bucks in Iowa. If you want a big Shiras bull, Washington has some of the biggest Shiras bulls in the country. The mountain goat tag sold here for ~$25k. You can do a couple BC mountain goat hunts for that money and hunt the biggest goats in the world. These guys have more reasons than just killing giant animals when buying these tags.

Shouldn't it be troubling that the WDFW section manager is working with a forester from the other side of the state when the district bio (who I'm not a fan of)  has said there is a huntable population spread across his district for years? Special interest wins again and the average hunter gets screwed.  I hold zero ill will to the players but the game is fixed and rank and file hunters lose more opportunities.  This trend will continue.  Just like the deviation from the scientific sideboards simply to benefit the SALE of oil species.

The game is certainly fixed.

@trophyhunt

Would you rather have more moose tags a few years from now and an auction tag now or just say screw it...no more tags at all? Shoot me straight...

I have no problem with auction tags but if they are using all this money to benefit moose and increase the population so that the average joe will have more tags available why did they just reduce youth anterless cow tags from 18 to 1 tag? Maybe the problem with the auction tags are what they do with the money.

The moose population is hurting, not because of a governor tag, but due to disease and wolves, I would support an end to all antlerless moose hunting until the population begins increasing again.

 

There is no reason for anyone to be harvesting cow moose right now.

I doubt with current trends we will have more than 20 permits within 10 years statewide.  I got a problem with special areas only available to auction.  Should manage it like sheep where there has to be a tag for a regular joe or open it to all.