Cow moose at Diablo Lake

[jackelope]

We came back west from Winthrop on Monday and came over the bridge over Thunder Bay on Diablo Lake and looked up towards the inlet and there was a cow moose standing in the bay up to about her belly in the water. We were going pretty slow so we had plenty of time to decide it was in fact a moose, but no camera handy.
Pretty neat. I remember seeing some pics of a pair of moose running along the road from that same general area from a while back. I wonder how many are running around in there?
Sorry for the lack of pics.

[Wea300mag]

Sweet, hopefully we will reach a huntable number of them over here in my lifetime.

[shanevg]

My wife was just telling me she saw a bull moose between Cle Elum and Ellensburg right off of 90 on Sunday. Is that uncommon at all. I have never heard of them over there myself but don't spend a lot of time there either.

Sure seem to be moose popping up in a lot of weird places lately. Kind of fun to track their migration westward.

[jackelope]

There's been some seen in the Teanaway so same general area.
 

[Kola16]

My uncle said he seen a giant bull moose at Ross Lake, and I seen a dead cow a little more east on the side of the road 

[losdaddy7]

We've seen moosein the Methow several times and also at Lake Wenatchee...  They seem to be moving further west every year.

[bigtex]

Friend sent me a picture of a moose he saw at Diablo Lake last weekend as well.

[Kola16]

We've seen moosein

Is that a new race  JK

[Knocker of rocks]

In agreement with others, my  understanding is that there is that there is a resident population in the Lake Wenatchee corridor, with transients to at least Cle Elum.  I would guess that there are some moose in the Methow and lower portions of the Pasayten who are at the least semi-resident.  Many areas around Ross Lake would make attractive moose grounds for transients from the Methow, Wenatchee-Chiwawa system or from BC.

Anthropological evidence primarily from Indian middens shows that Native Americans feasted on moose in these areas at least to the late 1800's.  Evidence of moose in the Cascades became sparser, but not non-existent for about the last fifty years.  There definitely seems to be an increasing population of transients and marginal residents on the very south western (the North Cascades)  extent of their range.

Since NE Washington has had a strong population, and even then less that 150 moose are allowed to be taken, I would guess that the Cascades maintaining a moose population large enough to allow hunting is unlikely.  But given the changing dynamics of rainfall and snowfall, many things are possible in the long term.

[Knocker of rocks]

Here are the tracks we found near the end of Thunder Arm.  They are about 3 1/2" to 4 1/4" long. 

[seth30]

Sweet, hopefully we will reach a huntable number of them over here in my lifetime.

as long as the wolves dont get this far over.