With many Mat-Su moose dying from starvation and collisions with motor vehicles, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game on Friday cancelled all antlerless moose hunts in Game Management Unit 14A this year.

The area supports an estimated 7,400 moose, according to a survey done last year – well above the objective of 6,500 set by Fish and Game.  “This is the most productive herd in the state,” state wildlife technician Nick Cassara said of the 14A population.  That’s partly due to the 1996 Big Lake fire that helped create moose forage in a portion of the area as well as a succession of mild winters – until this year – during which moose could easily scrape down and eat leaves and herbaceous plants.

But the winter of 2011-12 brought heavy snowfall and bouts of brutally cold weather.

“We are seeing an unusually high death rate for moose in the Mat-Su,” said Tim Peltier, the acting area biologist for wildlife conservation. “We don’t know how bad this winter will be for the moose population, and we don’t want to exacerbate the situation,” Peltier said.

When winter started and permit applications were accepted for 2012, the area moose population was considered strong by Fish and Game, but biologists now expect that to change.

The hunts were cancelled well before the permit drawing. Application fees for the cancelled hunts will be refunded by mail. Cassara said that if Fish and Game waited until summer before deciding, applicants would have lost their permit application fee as well as an opportunity to apply for other hunts.

“The cleanest thing was to just cancel the hunt,” Cassara said. Fish and Game plans to reassess the moose population in GMU 14A this fall to determine how many animals were lost.

The results of the drawing hunt for Tier I and Tier II were released late Friday afternoon and are available on the Fish and Game website.