Watch above: Warman’s deputy fire chief says more residents than usual are reporting moose sightings on highways leading in and out of the city. Joel Senick reports.
WARMAN, Sask. – Warman’s deputy fire chief says he’s receiving more reports of moose near highways going in and out of the city than in previous years.
This past weekend, first responders attended to three collisions that involved moose on Highway 11 near Warman.
“An F-150 had a collision with a moose, they had some vehicle damage, hit the ditch and seconds later a car that was following them hit the carcass of the moose on the road,” said Russ Austin, Warman’s deputy fire chief.
“I’ve had one moose collision in 22 years and now we’ve had three in two days,” he added.
SGI received 48 more claims of vehicle damage due to collisions with moose in 2014, compared to 2013, according to their statistics.
“The data on the increase in collisions with moose, the number of people being killed by moose … those have all been on the increase,” said Ryan Brook, the director of the farmland moose study at the University of Saskatchewan.
Brook’s work tracks the migration of moose between Saskatoon and Regina. He says the moose population in and around the area has increased in the past 10 years, possibly due to a lack of predators south of Prince Albert, access to crops to eat and a decrease in the number of rural farms.
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“For drivers the most important thing is to know that now when you’re driving in farmland, you have to be watching for deer and elk and other wildlife, but also moose,” said Brook.
“The amount of traffic and the amount of wildlife that we’re starting to see, it’s one of those things, you’ve got to be very wary,” said Austin, who added that roughly 10,000 cars likely travel on the highway between Warman and Saskatoon daily.
Brook said he can’t say for sure if the moose population will keep increasing in Saskatchewan, but added that the southern portion of the province has the habitat to support a large number of moose.
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