The first photocensus was done in 1970. Eleven other censuses have been successfully completed since then. It gives us a foundation upon which to base decisions about hunting seasons and bag limits. Fish and Game estimate that hunters, most of them from nearby villages, harvest about 23,000 animals from the herd each year. More than 21,000 people live within the herd's range.
Caribou are critical to their livelihood.
Dau cautioned that, as with all wildlife population estimates, there is some uncertainty associated with the 1999 estimate. The large size of the herd and proximity of coastal fog forced biologists to take pictures at an unusually high altitude in 1999. As a result, images of caribou were small and counters may have missed many calves. This may explain the apparent decline from 1996 to 1999, even though annual Fish and Game estimates of adult mortality and calf survival suggest the herd should have increased. Even if the 1999 estimate is conservative, it shows the herd is still very large and, if declining, is doing so slowly.