Ten bull moose, including one sub-legal animal, were harvested in the first week of the three-week Haines subsistence hunt that started Sept. 15.
Area management biologist Anthony Crupi said six animals had a spiked or forked antler, one had three brow tines on an antler and two had racks exceeding 50 inches.
That’s about an average harvest after one week in the local hunt, Crupi said. Spiked or forked antlers occur in younger bulls, which hunters may be seeing more of because the rut has just barely started.
Bulls with spikes or forks are easy for hunters to identify and culls the herd of moose less likely to survive the winter than mature ones, Crupi said. They made up 30 percent of last year’s harvest.
As mating season starts in earnest, hunters are likely to find more mature animals. “They’ll start to congregate their harems as the rut comes in.” A harvested moose with a 54-inch rack had six cows around him, Crupi said.
The hunt is open until Oct. 7 and the guideline harvest limit is 20 to 25 animals.
Forfeiture of the sub-legal moose led the hunter’s family members to become upset during an incident at the Fish and Game office, but the matter wasn’t serious enough to warrant charges, wildlife trooper Ricky Merritt said.
Merritt said family members of the hunter were “fairly hostile,” yelled and used swear words, but did not make any direct threats to him or biologist Crupi.
“It’s not against the law to curse at Anthony and me,” Merritt said. “Just because a person is upset and uses foul language doesn’t make it illegal.”
After being told the moose was illegal, the hunter returned home with the animal, but told Crupi where he was going, Merritt said. Merritt went to the man’s home and measured the moose, and the man returned the animal to the Fish and Game office.
The hunter was “upset but reasonable,” Merritt said.
Two biologists and two enforcement officials inspected the moose’s antler configuration.
“There’s no way that, by the definition, we could make (the moose) legal. We don’t always agree with what’s out there, but we don’t write the laws. We just enforce them,” Merritt said.
The hunter did not return messages left by the newspaper.