This is why I always nail my moose down.

I'll bet that's where the passenger pigeons went too.

Stupid scientists, what do they know?

Herbivores are sneaky like that, moving where the food is.

BurnShrike: ARTHUR: The swallow may fly south with the sun or the house martin or the plumber may seek warmer climes in winter yet these are not strangers to our land.
GUARD #1: Are you suggesting caribou migrate?

Not at all. They could be carried.

"Global warming/climate change is a Lie-beral LIE" trifecta now in play.

Moved....north. Because of climate change?

Reindeer heading north? Inconcievable!

Naturally, I went looking for the original information.

I found a 2008/2009 report on the Beverley Cariboo Herd from cariboo herd management (not the head cows, the people on the Management Board that has been set up to oversee the herd).
Link: http://www.arctic-caribou.com/news_winter08-09.html#facts

First, the article above points out that the scientists did consult with native hunters (who consulted their elders) and that this information was, correctly, taken into account. The issue is that herds are not discrete organisms--they are made up of cariboo which stick together more or less, and cariboo can move from herd to herd. The scientists used to define herds in terms of their calving grounds. It has become clear that the cariboo, even cariboo herds, are not as loyal to calving grounds as thought, and the scientists therefore have leaned towards defining herds in terms of animals sticking together. This shift means that you have to shift from counting cariboo at the calving grounds to following the comings and goings of cariboo joining and leaving herds year round.

In any case, this report I found makes some things clearer about the facts of the case.

One, the herd has been declining (in terms of calving females at the calving grounds, pregnant females as a percentage of total females, etc.). Second, there is more than one calving ground and therefore more than one calving ground needs to be protected. Third, the range of this herd is enormous--from Northern Saskatchewan to Nunavut. This is an area equal in size to the range of the Northern American bison herds that once roamed the American and Canadian West in vast numbers.

It's not easy to track hundreds of thousands of individual cariboo. It's not even easy to track migratory herds, which like flocks of birds may gain and lose members to other herds, some migratory, some more or less fixed in stable ranges.

Point: The herd is in decline, apparently.

Only 189 adult female caribou (cows) were counted on the Beverly calving ground during the 2007 survey and only 93 cows were seen during the June 2008 calving ground survey. That's down from 5,737 seen in 1994.

Another sign of trouble: only 15 calves for every 100 cows were found during the 2008 reconnaissance survey. That's far below the 80 calves per 100 cows found on the calving grounds of healthy barren-ground caribou near the peak of calving.

And a third red flag popped up in April 2008 when blood samples from 28 Beverly and Ahiak cows on which satellite collars were being placed revealed that fewer than half those animals were pregnant.

"That's very unusual for caribou anywhere," NWT ungulate biologist Jan Adamczewski told Caribou News in Brief. A pregnancy rate of 70 to 80 percent is the norm.
http://www.arctic-caribou.com/news_winter08-09.html#facts

Point: The surveys don't count cariboo. They identify calving grounds. Thus a major decline at one calving ground may look like loses but the cariboo may simply be elsewhere.

Reconnaissance surveys don't estimate population sizes. They map the location of concentrated calving grounds and provide information about the numbers of caribou on the calving ground at the peak of calving in a given year. The Beverly herd was last successfully counted in 1994, when it numbered about 276,000. Bad weather grounded the GNWT's June 2007 attempt to do another population survey.
http://www.arctic-caribou.com/news_winter08-09.html#facts

Third point: If this report (2008/2009) is the basis of the media claim that global warming was suspected (not a definite and exclusive cause) then the report acknowledge the unknowns and the spin by denialists is BS:

A mix of factors may be to blame for the population drop, and the exact cause may never be known. The decline may be part of a natural cycle. The herd may also have been affected by exploration and development, hunter harvest, changes in habitat (including winter range being lost to forest fires), parasites and diseases, predation and climate change, as well as some mixing between the Beverly and Ahiak caribou herds.

AND NOW FOR THE GRAND FINALE!

The (single) hunter who claimed that the cariboo herd had simply mingled with other herds also believes that fires and global warming have altered the behaviour of the herd:

Hunter disagrees on decline

The Beverly herd's range stretches from northern Saskatchewan through the NWT to Nunavut.

At least one Saskatchewan hunter thinks the Beverly herd has not declined, however, but has moved north. BQCMB alternate member Pierre Robillard of Black Lake, who participated in the GNWT's 2008 reconnaissance survey with BQCMB member Dennis Larocque of Camsell Portage, thinks Beverly caribou have mixed with other herds north of Baker Lake. Robillard feels that global warming and far-reaching wildfires have pushed the Beverly out of his province. Fire "really, really affects the caribou."

WOOF! THERE IT IS! WOOF! THERE IT IS!

In your face, denialists!

Conclusion: Case against the scientists is MOSTLY BULL shiat.

We all know that global warming is likely to increase the number of wildfires. We all know that the number of wildfires, areas burned, etc., are increasing and have for the last few decades. We all know that it's not easy to attribute any particular event to climate change, but that lots and lots of particular events of the type predicted, in the place and time predicted, bear the fingerprints of climate change.

In short, the scientists and other herd managers weren't wrong, you can't prove that they were wrong, the record proves, if anything, that their concerns are legitimate, and the guy cited against them was actually consulted AND QUOTED by them and actually shares their concerns.

About par for the course for denialism.

Executive Summary of my previous post:

Bite me!

make me some tea: I'll bet that's where the passenger pigeons went too.

Stupid scientists, what do they know?

LOL
except that we know EXACTLY what happened to the passenger pigeons, PEOPLE ATE THEM.