A subadult brown bear stands on June 8, 2018, on the shore of Naknek Lake in Katmai National Park and Preserve. A state program that is killing bears in an effort to boost an ailing caribou herd was found last week to be unconstitutional, but the Department of Fish and Game is now seeking emergency authority to continue the program. Opponents say the predator-control program will not help the caribou but could put Katmai bears at risk. (Photo by Russ Taylor/National Park Service)
Alaska officials are seeking emergency authorization to keep killing bears and wolves in a region in the western part of the state even though a judge ruled a week ago that the state predator control program there was unconstitutional.
The Alaska Department of Fish and Game on Friday petitioned the state Board of Game for an emergency regulation allowing the “intensive management” program to continue for a third year in the range of the ailing Mulchatna Caribou Herd.
The proposal came on the first day of an eight-day Board of Game meeting in Anchorage. The board sets hunting rules that are carried out by the department.
The Mulchatna herd, in Western Alaska, peaked at 200,000 animals in 1997, but it is now down to about 13,000 animals. Hunting has been closed for several years. Department officials argue that removal of bears and wolves is needed to help the herd population grow back. Residents of dozens of rural communities in the region have traditionally depended on the herd for food, and increased caribou numbers would allow their hunts to start again, department officials argue.
So far, the state program that started in 2023 has killed nearly 200 bears and 19 wolves through the program, according to the department.
That has already benefited the herd, as seen in the increase in the number of calves born, the department’s proposal said. Continuing the program is “critical” to the goal of getting the herd large enough to allow resumed hunting, it said.
“Not being able to conduct control efforts in the third year is detrimental to the program and will result in a loss of the improvements in calf recruitment and survival that have been realized since the department treatment began in 2023,” the department’s proposal said.
The Alaska Wildlife Alliance, the plaintiff in the case that resulted in last week’s ruling, said the Department of Fish and Game is attempting to circumvent the law.
“We’re just kind of stunned right now,” Nicole Schmitt, the alliance’s executive director, said during a break in the Board of Game’s meeting on Friday.
The late proposal, released just that morning, was also rushed without proper public notice or opportunity for public comment, just as the earlier predator-control authorization had been, Schmitt said.
“The state is trying to push through an emergency regulation, in the hopes that it is not stopped before they are done killing bears, lawfully or otherwise,” she said.
Superior Court Judge Andrew Guidi, in his March 14 ruling, found that the Board of Game’s action in 2022 that authorized the predator control program violated constitutional standards for public notice and public comment. The Alaska Wildlife Alliance and Michelle Bittner, an Anchorage attorney who filed a separate lawsuit challenging the predator-culling program, argued that the board rushed its approval through improper and secretive means.
Guidi also found that the board’s approval of bear kills in the Mulchatna caribou range failed to properly consider impacts to the bear population, in violation of constitutional mandates for sustainable management.
Supporters and opponents of the Mulchatna predator control program disagree about the causes of the caribou herd’s decline.
While department officials point to bears and wolves as limiting recovery, opponents of the bear- and wolf-killing program say other factors caused the caribou decline. Those include some sweeping habitat changes, with a warming climate allowing woody bushes and trees to spread into tundra territory. Caribou from herds like the Mulchatna depend on tundra plants for food, but the proliferation of woody plants has made the area more favorable for moose.
Disease is another factor cited as a reason for the caribou population decline.
The Board of Game has identified a goal of getting the population back up to between 30,000 and 80,000 animals, enough to support hunts of 2,400 to 8,000 caribou a year, according to the Department of Fish and Game.
GET THE MORNING HEADLINES.