Deep snow taking heavy toll on moose

SANDPOINT - Moose in the Panhandle have good reasons to wear their long faces this winter.

Deep snow in Bonner and Boundary counties are causing the glassy eyed ruminants to gravitate toward the county's roads and railroad tracks, which is having deadly consequences.

“They tend to use those as travel corridors and they're not very good at getting out of the way, especially out of the way of trains,” said Chip Corsi, the Idaho Department of Fish and Game's regional supervisor.

The department has documented as many as 150 moose deaths this winter as a result of collisions with locomotives and vehicles.

“We did lose quite a few moose this winter due to that,” said Corsi.

Sandpoint was lousy with moose this winter because of their desire to get away from post-holing through the snowpack and on the path of least resistance. Corsi said ornamental shrubs found in developed areas are something of a delicacy among moose, not to mention easy pickings.

Reports of injured moose were also prevalent.

Corsi said the department's general guideline for dealing with injured big game animals is to leave them be and have nature take its course. A leg injury, for example, is not necessarily a death sentence.

“There's quite a few big animals that are basically getting around pretty well on three legs,” Corsi said.

If an animal is beyond saving or is posing a safety risk to the public, a Fish & Game officer or local law officer will put it out of its misery. Game managers will not relocate an injured animal, although Corsi said healthy ones which become a nuisance in developed areas are sometimes drugged and moved.

But Laclede resident Sharon Marsonette said she and her neighbors endured a “hellacious” week this month watching a moose's injured yearling calf weaken and die on the edge of Riley Creek Road.

Marsonette, who believes the animal was suffering enough to justify its destruction, said she was unable to get Fish & Game to deal with the calf. She said a sheriff's deputy checked on the animal, but he apparently did not agree the moose needed to be killed.

“It cried for four solid days and they just said, ‘leave it be,'” said Marsonette, who does not consider herself squeamish when it comes to the harsh realities of nature. “There was no excuse for somebody not tending to the animal.”

Marsonette added that it's not the first time she's had trouble getting Fish & Game to respond to an injured animal report in her neighborhood.

Corsi said he was not aware of the injured calf in Laclede, although he explained that Fish & Game conservation officers fielded “dozens and dozens” of injured game reports this winter. Conservation officers are currently keeping tabs on an injured moose in the Ponderay area, he said.

“If we find any big game animal that's clearly not going to make it and is suffering or posing a risk to somebody, then we may put it down,” Corsi said.