Wednesday, 07 December 2011 14:06
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| Photo: Mike Bedell. The Canadian Press. |
Division of Wildlife area biologist Rebecca Schwanke in Glennallen reported that to date drawing permit hunters, various types of state subsistence hunters, and federal subsistence hunters have reported killing 2,363 Nelchina caribou. The quota for the year is 2,400. She expects it will be exceeded.
The Nelchina herd, which roams the foothills of Alaska Range north, east and west of Glennallen, numbers about 40,000 animals. Because it is one of the few road accessible herds in the state, and because it is close to the state's population center, focused around Anchorage only 150 miles to the southeast, it has been the most fought-over caribou herd in the state.
Hunting has for years been limited to federal subsistence hunters, who need only claim residence in one of several roadside communities in the area to hunt, and state-recognized subsistence hunters in various forms. The old system generally limited permits to local residents who lived in the area or Alaskans who claimed 20 or more years of hunting experience or a family history of such hunting experience in the area.
Subsistence is an ill-defined term in Alaska when it comes to hunting and fishing. Though generally thought of as a definition of people struggling to survive while living off the land, the term has been categorically defined to eliminate "need'' as a requirement to qualify in the 49th state. To do so, various interest groups have argued, would deny hunting opportunities to people with a cultural connection to the land.
Who gets permits?
Problems have arisen because guaranteeing various minorities -- including old, well-to-do white Alaskans such as the parents of former Gov. Sarah Palin -- the opportunity to hunt has sometimes ended up denying the majority the opportunity to hunt. The old state subsistence permit system so favored longtime Alaskans, and was so widely abused by people fudging their connections to historical Nelchina hunting, that the regulations were amended to now award subsistence permits only to hunters who agreed to limit their caribou hunting to the Nelchina basin, and to hunters from specified communities that qualified for community permits.
The "community permit" issue was itself highly contentious, but in the bigger scheme of things, it turns out to have amounted to little. The community permit hunt was the last to be closed this year. It will end at sundown Tuesday, and Schwanke reported only 83 caribou have so far been reported killed by hunters with community permits.
The bulk of the animals -- 1,708 bulls and 653 cows at last report -- were killed by people claiming state Tier I subsistence permits. Those were the people who basically agreed to limit their hunting for the year to the Nelchina Basin.
Schwanke reported another 365 caribou killed on federal permits, although that hunt continues, and with the caribou now close to the highway system, many animals are expected to be shot. The federal subsistence hunt focuses heavily along roads, often taking place in Alaska highway corridors.
The last bunch of Nelchina caribou reported killed, Schwanke said, were bulls taken in connection with a state drawing permit hunt. There were were 311 such caribou shot. The drawing-permit hunt was added by the state Board of Game to ensure that all Alaskans at least get a chance to a chance to hunt Nelchina caribou. The drawing is open to any hunter who pays a small fee to enter a lottery for a permit.
What system will be in place for handing out Nelchina permits next year is unknown. Regulations for the hunt are almost annually challenged in court, and the state Board of Game, a citizens group that advises Fish and Game on management, regularly rewrites the rules for the hunt to try to satisfy public demands for a fairer system.