Annual Mi'kmaq feast held in Cape Breton despite moose hunting moratorium

For years, the Feast in the Highlands atop Hunters Mountain - just off Cape Breton’s Cabot Trail - has been a Mi'kmaq fall tradition, but this year was a bit different.

"(It) sucks that you can't hunt moose in Cape Breton this year, for three years. I'm kind of bummed out,” said Isaac Propser, a Grade 11 student from nearby We’kok’maq First Nation.

"They had been kept away from Hunters Mountain for decades, and they finally won the rights to come back and harvest moose under the treaties and under their Aboriginal rights, so it became a celebration of that,” said Mi’kmaq rights negotiator Eric Zscheile, explaining the history behind the annual feast.

Last July the Nova Scotia government and the Assembly of Nova Scotia Mi'kmaq Chiefs made the joint decision to suspend moose hunting in the Cape Breton Highlands - for Mi’kmaq hunters and non-Native licence holders alike - for the next three years due to low moose populations.

Despite the restriction, moose meat was still served to the hundreds of people at the feast on Thursday.

"One-hundred pounds, and it was a donation from one of our harvesters who harvested in 2023 and saved it for this occasion,” said Clifford Paul, a moose management coordinator with the Unama’ki Institute of Natural Resources.

Nova Scotia Natural Resources Minister Tory Rushton attended the event and talked with people familiar with the local habitat about possible solutions.

"I did sample some moose meat, and talked with the person who hunted the moose,” Rushton said. "We certainly need some academia assistance and some knowledge of the area as we move forward in these discussions."

Some event organizers said at this point they can only hope traditional moose meat will be served at next year’s Feast in the Highlands.

"We might not have moose on the menu next year, but we're keeping an eye. We're hopeful for a recovery,” Paul said.

The province said its 2024 survey showed a drop of nearly half in the Highlands moose population from about 1,500 to roughly 835.

"I think over the next year we'll be spending a lot of time just trying to figure out what it will take to get the moose population back to where we want it to be,” Zscheile said.

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