THUNDER BAY — There's a big problem with Ontario's points-based moose tag allocation process.
When the province implemented a new procedure for resident hunters four years ago, it was intended to make the system fairer for everyone, but as it turned out, thousands of tags wound up going unclaimed.
The Ministry of Natural Resources is now proposing changes to address that issue.
"We acknowledged that in the first few years there were going to be some bugs to work out, and some things to possibly re-tool," said John Kaplanis, executive director of the Northwestern Ontario Sportsmen's Alliance, a lobby group for hunters and anglers.
The points-based process awards tags to hunters based on points that accumulate for each year they apply but are unsuccessful.
Since 2021, one point has been awarded – retroactively to 1983 – for each year that anyone who has ever applied for a moose tag and did not receive one.
Kaplanis explained that, currently, in the first stage of what he conceded is a somewhat complicated process, hunters can submit up to three choices for a tag according to which wildlife management unit (WMU) they wish to hunt in and whether they prefer a tag for a bull, a cow or a calf.
Those with the most points get preference for a tag, but at the cost of all their points regardless of how many they have accumulated.
Tags that aren't awarded or aren't claimed in this primary stage are made available in a "second chance" allocation, prior to which the ministry discloses the WMUs that have leftover tags.
At this stage, hunters' first choices for tags are again awarded based on points, while second and third choices are awarded using a random draw, with no impact on accumulated points.
But tags that either aren't awarded, or aren't claimed and paid for, simply go unused.
An average of 3,000 tags have gone unclaimed each year
"What happens – which we didn't really foresee – is that because hunters have until the very last day of the season to claim their tags, we're actually seeing a lot of tags go unclaimed for some reason," said Mark Ryckman, manager of policy with the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters.
"It could be because hunters had more tags available to them than they actually needed. It's also possible that personal issues arise and people can't hunt for whatever reason. In the first three years, 3,000 tags were going unclaimed per year. Some of these are not highly sought-after, like calf tags or tags for really far north wildlife management units that are inaccessible, but some of those tags are actually highly sought after, like bull tags for the gun hunt.
Ryckman said the structure of the current system "allows and even encourages people to not claim tags."
The solution that was developed is to require any hunter awarded a tag for their first choice in the second draw to forfeit their points regardless of whether they proceed to purchase the tag.
No one from the MNR was made available for an interview, but the ministry said it's proposing changes to "get more tags into the hands of hunters who want them" by encouraging them to apply only for tags they intend to claim, and by making available certain unclaimed and unawarded tags.
Here's a summary of how it intends to accomplish this:
- Any hunter awarded a tag based on their first of three choices in the second-chance allocation will lose all their points, whether or not they decide to claim the tag.
- The deadline for claiming a tag in the second-chance allocation will be advanced to a date prior to the opening of the moose season.
- A third allocation step will make any unclaimed or unawarded tags available for purchase. The number of available tags will be announced ahead of time. Tags will be available from late August to mid-September, and tags purchased at this point will not impact a hunter's points. Modern automated processes will be utilized to avoid long waits on the phone to access a tag.
"It's not really something that is easily described," Ryckman said, "but the proposal is trying to do two things: To manipulate application behaviour to minimize the number of people apply for tags they don't intend to claim, and the addition of that third step. It's not a draw. It's a first come, first served system."
New system will ensure 'tags wind up in hunters' hands'
Details of how the new last-chance stage of the allocation will be conducted have not been released yet, and Ryckman said there's some debate among hunters over the appropriateness of a first come, first served process.
But he said the OFAH "gives kudos" to the MNR for takng steps to address the issue of unclaimed tags so that hunting opportunities aren't wasted.
Kaplanis said the Northwestern Ontario Sportsmen's Alliance believes the ministry's plan "is going to provide a significant amount of relief to hunters, to make sure those tags wind up in hunters' hands. And it's also going to be made very clear...if you don't want to claim tags in the second draw in the first choice, then don't apply in that phase of the draw."
He noted, though, that "moose hunters are a very diverse group. If you put 10 hunters in a room, you're going to get 10 different ideas on how they think moose management, and the draw, should be run."
The province will continue to gather input on the changes through the Environmental Registry of Ontario until Nov. 22.
There are about 94,000 animals in the province's moose herd, and the population is considered to be stable overall, but some individual wildlife management units have experienced population declines.