Footloose Nelchina herd caribou are messing up end-of-winter hunting in parts of the Alaska Interior, according to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.
Usually content to stay south of the Alaska Range, the Nelchina animals this year have wandered far north and into the Yukon River valley range of the Fortymile herd.
That has forced a hunt closure along the Taylor Highway north of Tok even though about 50 caribou remain to be harvested to reach the hunt's quota.
"The southern portion of (hunt) Zone 3 remains closed because large numbers of Nelchina herd caribou are still present," the agency said in a Thursday press release. "Southern Zone 3 will open if the Nelchina caribou herd leaves the area.''
Hunters can't tell caribou in the two herds apart. They look the same. But biologists tracking radio-collared animals can sort out which is which.
Fortymile hunt zones 1, 2 and 4 to the north and west of Tok close on Sunday. Tok Area wildlife biologist Jeff Gross expects that hunters venturing off the Steese Highway and Chena Hot Springs Road will have killed 422 Fortymile caribou by then.
The winter harvest quota for the Fortymile is 472. Hunting season is set to run through March 31 but it remains to be seen whether it will ever reopen. Details are available at hunt.alaska.gov.
The Fortymile herd is the largest in the Interior. It numbers about 50,000 animals.