I got in on the last hour of the WACH advisory management meeting here tonight. Picked up the agenda/ outline and stuff and talked to one of the Brown Shirts about what I'd missed in summary during the day.
The Fed Sub Board DID close Fed public lands to all but "Federally qualified subsistence users" with a press release on April 18, effective July 1, 2016 thru June 30 2017. Says so right here on their News Release, page 44 of the Agenda.
Which means effectively that non-subsistence users are SOL for 2017 also, even if it is reopened July 1. Real short time frame there, but keep it in mind as a possibility. Bags packed, gun cased, ammo loaded, air taxis on speed dial.....
Other info: The last effective census was in 2014. I believe I mis-stated the population as 130K, but it was 230K! Estimated at about 200K now. From other indicators, it appears the decline has greatly slowed, perhaps even stabilized. Cow mortality is down, calf survival/recruitment is up, and last summer calf weights at the annual Onion Portage were at an all time record. Range conditions appear good, and we had a good winter since.
Harvest last year appeared to be about 12,500 overall. 60% bulls, 30 % cows, 10% unknown.
WACH has a management goal of no less than 40 bulls/100 cows, and it appears we are real near that. At that point restrictions such as above kick in.
I don't know what "bull" is - whether it is all males, or just the breeding age ones. I'll ask Brandon tomorrow.
One obvious solution, of course, is to shoot a bunch of those damned cows off to get the ratio up......oh wait- we are doing that.
