2017-08-22 Game Management Advisory Commission Minutes

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Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – August 22, 2017 KS: No, I mean, so we proposed – the fences that we have proposed are all that we have proposed for this plan. I mean, it’s a 25 year plan and if we’re successful and we’ve fenced the 8,000 and eight years, ten years – whatever it is and then everything’s so awesome we can manage everything in there perfectly – maybe after 25 years maybe we’ll try to fence more – but what we’re trying to fence and manage is a lot already. And so I don’t anticipate any extra fencing within that 25 year time frame. TL: Are you gonna get into when you’re gonna start introducing animals to the area? KS: Let’s go on with my presentation. In September 2016, we captured a bunch of sheep across the area – mostly in the mauka section – so mauka of Mamalahoa Highway – and so 82 sheep that we captured and handled – we fitted those numbers there – 15 females, 9 males with GPS collars – seven females, nine males with VHF collars – so those are the numbers – 24 and 16 each – the animals that we put collars on we took blood samples – Willie-Joe was very helpful with us – we took our blood samples to him and they spun ‘em down for us and we got a lot of data and information from that. We also did a rump fat measurement using an ultrasound machine – rump fat thickness is an indication of health – of animal health – so I have some of those numbers after. We drew blood – we did that – we took a whole bunch of measurements – so for our blood samples we tested for selenium, calcium, copper, iron, phosphorous and zinc. And also magnesium. Across the board – all of the animals were low – so if you can see – I didn’t bring a pointer or anything – but that graph – everything on the – the two on the left side males and females were animals that were captured in Puuanahulu and the two on the right side males and females were captured in Puuwaawaa. Across the board except magnesium – they were finding magnesium but across the board all the animals were on the low end of normal or outside of normal for those other minerals that we tested from. We haven’t done any DNA analysis yet, we haven’t found anyone that can do it for us. We’re interested in finding out what type of sheep are there historically – we also – I’m interested – I don’t know if we can – if the test exists or we’re gonna be able to do it but there’s a poled gene and I want to know where that – so poled is no horns right – so I’m interested in finding out where that – what type of gene that is – if it’s sex limited or if it’s chromosomal – to see what kind of management actions we can do to lower that gene in that population. And we also did pregnancy tests with the blood samples. \[Discussion\] TL: What are you studying for on the minerals? KS: Just for animal health. 14