The fight to protect Nova Scotia’s vanishing mainland moose

UngulateNerd92

UngulateNerd92

Well-Known Member
10+ year member
Premium Member
Nina Newington was guiding her pickup truck down a gravel logging road in southwestern Nova Scotia in October, a half an hour from any paved roadway, when she saw it: a 900-acre-sized wasteland where old-growth trees used to be.

“The forest, it was just gone,” she recalled. “It was like driving into the largest parking lot you’ve ever seen.”

This land, in the wooded heart of Digby County, is one of the last few remaining patches of untouched Acadian forest left in the province. And it’s home to an endangered moose population, those solitary giants of the woods that once roamed widely but are now believed to number fewer than 100 on mainland Nova Scotia.

https://www-theglobeandmail-com.cdn...ght-to-protect-mainland-moose-in-nova-scotia/
 
Moose utilize areas of regrowth (following burns or timber harvesting) for feeding. The availability of such areas (I’d wager) might even contribute to population growth among Moose. Probably other factors (climate change, parasites, suburban development, completion with White-tail Deer, increased Black Bear numbers) are more detrimental to maintaining high densities of Moose. I believe the current decline among Moose in New England and the Maritimes is primarily attributed to tick infestations due to warmer winters...the other factors serve as multipliers to the effect of the tick. Cutting old growth (if the area is allowed to regrow and not lost to development) would probably be a mitigating factor to the general decline.

On Alaska’s Kenai Peninsula, Moose numbers boomed following a series of large fires clearing out the forests and allowing large areas of new growth to take root. As the forest changed, Moose had less “habitat” available and numbers began to decline. Soon predator control measures against Brown Bears and Wolves were implemented to try to take pressure off the Moose and push their numbers back up to what people had been used too. What the state should have done was allowed (maybe encouraged) the natural fire cycle to resume and clear out the forests.

Following a large fire, outdoorsy-type Alaskans will often be heard remarking that the burned area will be “good Moose hunting next year”.”
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top