Montana Mule Deer issues

[skydiver386]

Can Cutting Tags Fix Montana’s Deer Problem?

Western states have a mule deer problem. Deer populations are down across the board, leaving fish and game commissions grasping for means to mitigate the declines. Often, the only lever immediately within reach is a control on hunting pressure, which commissioners are reluctant to touch, as it...

www.themeateater.com

Mule Deer have been in decline throughout the Western States for some time, but what can be done about it?

Hunting pressure is just one issue. Population growth, habitat destruction, wolves and other predators, plus the growth of the Whitetail Deer population all contribute in some way.

A few years ago, Wyoming issued unlimited Whitetail doe tags, and reduced the number of Mule Deer tags in an attempt to rectify the situation.

Your thoughts?

 

[Scott CWO]

The biggest threat to mule deer is the ridiculous CWD “Management” by the states. Tags in Colorado and many states have been tripled! CWD has never eliminated a deer population but the “management” of severely reducing populations and mature buck numbers is a situation where the cure is worse than the disease. In Eastern Colorado, we had good numbers of deer and lots of big bucks, even with 30% prevalence. Tags were tripled. Now we have fewer deer, smaller bucks and the prevalence is still 30% after seven years of this foolishness. There is no cure for CWD. The prions are now in the soil, water and even uptaking into plants. We could get rid of all the deer, bring in new deer and within a short period of time, the new deer would get CWD from the environment. The only bright spot is a partial genetic resistance that some deer are exhibiting. In mule deer, the more resistant genetic deer are 225F. These deer rarely get CWD in the wild and if they do get it, they live longer than the 225S deer that get it more easily and die faster. Shooting all deer slows down the natural selection process that would take hundreds of years to work its way out. But biologists want to “do something” now, which is human nature, even if wrong.

 

[375 Ruger Fan]

I've hunted the Paradise Valley area for over 20 years and the whitetail population is out of control.

 

[Scott CWO]

Can Cutting Tags Fix Montana’s Deer Problem?

Western states have a mule deer problem. Deer populations are down across the board, leaving fish and game commissions grasping for means to mitigate the declines. Often, the only lever immediately within reach is a control on hunting pressure, which commissioners are reluctant to touch, as it...

www.themeateater.com

Mule Deer have been in decline throughout the Western States for some time, but what can be done about it?

Hunting pressure is just one issue. Population growth, habitat destruction, wolves and other predators, plus the growth of the Whitetail Deer population all contribute in some way.

A few years ago, Wyoming issued unlimited Whitetail doe tags, and reduced the number of Mule Deer tags in an attempt to rectify the situation.

Your thoughts?

I read the article. I’ve been managing big ranches for mule deer since 1997. It’s not rocket science. Mule deer cannot handle liberal tag numbers. A cut of 2500 tags is helpful but probably too small to make much difference. As for big buck management, I get tired of hearing that rut hunting is the problem. Any species can be hunted in the rut if tags are low enough. The problem is tags numbers need to be quite low if hunting in the rut, which is sometimes unacceptable socially. In that case, the seasons should be moved out of the rut but that doesn’t mean that tag numbers should be increased a great deal. A moderate increase would be okay but only if not a large increase. Many states like WY and MT just issue way too many tags to grow big bucks. In Colorado when tags were completely limited in 1999 and reduced, our deer hunting improved significantly. Now, CWD “Management” has taken us back down.

 

[skydiver386]

I've hunted the Paradise Valley area for over 20 years and the whitetail population is out of control.

Whitetails seem to adapt to agricultural areas better than Mule Deer.

I've also read that Mule Deer does will breed with Whitetail bucks, but Whitetail does will not breed with Mule Deer bucks. I've seen a good number of good Mule Deer bucks that looked like they had genetic traits of a Whitetail. Coloration, antler formation, tail size and color, etc., all looked like a hybrid.

 

[Scott CWO]

Whitetails seem to adapt to agricultural areas better than Mule Deer.

I've also read that Mule Deer does will breed with Whitetail bucks, but Whitetail does will not breed with Mule Deer bucks. I've seen a good number of good Mule Deer bucks that looked like they had genetic traits of a Whitetail. Coloration, antler formation, tail size and color, etc., all looked like a hybrid.

Hybrids exist but are difficult to identify correctly. We killed this deer in 2009 in Colorado. I sent its DNA to Jim Heffelfinger, a Biologist with AZGFD, who was doing a hybrid study. It turned out to be a 50/50 first generation hybrid. The only true way to tell is by DNA and the glands on the rear legs. White-tailed deer glands are small and low on the rear legs. Mule deer glands are much larger and higher up on the rear legs. 50/50 hybrid deer have medium-sized glands that are higher on the leg than a white-tail deer.

This buck had a tail more similar to a white-tailed deer but could not flag it. He stuck the tail straight out when running but did not flag it side to side. His body was a true mixture with more of a white-tailed deer shape but a mixed head. His hair had an unusual, strange look and feel. His antlers resembled those of a white-tailed deer on the right but he did have a fork on his left G2 and G3, like a mule deer. However, you absolutely cannot just look at antlers when determining if a buck is a hybrid. Lots of mule deer have G2 points that never split. These are not hybrid deer. They are mule deer with poor genetics.

True hybrids are rare. They mostly occur when a white-tail buck chases a mule deer doe to submission. It can happen the other way around but is less common. First generation 50/50 hybrid bucks are sterile but will participate in the rut. It is believed that 50/50 does can produce offspring.

 

[skydiver386]

Hard to tell from the picture, but the tail appears to be the size of a Whitetail, but has a black tip.

Do you believe that more Whitetail doe tags can help boost the Mule Deer population, or would it be more dependent on geography?

 

[Scott CWO]

Hard to tell from the picture, but the tail appears to be the size of a Whitetail, but has a black tip.

Do you believe that more Whitetail doe tags can help boost the Mule Deer population, or would it be more dependent on geography?

Yes, the tail was more similar to a white-tailed deer tail but has the black tip of a mule deer tail. I have seen a few hybrid does with a similar tail but perhaps a bit shorter.

As for white-tail versus mule deer population dynamics, it’s complicated. In Eastern Colorado, our small river bottoms (South Platte, Republican, Arikaree and Arkansas) have been taken over by white-tailed deer that moved in from Kansas and Nebraska. This change over occurred back in the 1970s and 1980s when cattle grazing on the rivers was almost eliminated and white-tailed deer were moving westward. The riverbottoms are much thicker with the cattle gone. It’s hard to say which issue caused the change - lack of cattle or westward expansion of white-tailed deer. Perhaps a combination? The mule deer are now found in the more open areas and sandhills adjacent to the river and the white-tailed deer dominate the rivers. Obviously there are exceptions and we see a few mule deer on the rivers once in a while.

I can see that issuing more white-tailed doe tags could help the mule deer populations but perhaps only if food competition or habitat is a factor? If there’s enough food and habitat for both, I don’t think it would help much. Remember, these deer species evolved together and overlapping in parts of the West. I don’t think it’s an either or situation. I think local food and habitat limitations are a bigger issue. In that case, limiting white-tailed deer populations could help mule deer.

 

[steve white]

Texas has been offering white tail doe only hunts on WMD/Type II lands in the Palo Duro drainage for a good couple decades. Mule deer tags are much harder to draw. The Matador ranch south of Childress would certainly have statistics on their ranch. Don't know if old Chip has retired. We used to shoot them every year until they stopped having no show standby hunting. Haven't been in a long while and miss it. Brothers and I had it dialed in. The mule deer were cheeky--they would walk up and look inside your pop up blind! They knew they were not on the menu. Same with the white tail bucks. The does were the wary ones--complete reversal of usual order!
Last I kept up, the white tail/mule deer ratio was not improving, despite doe harvest. BUT if they returned to standby placements, their take would vastly increase.

Real cause of mulie decline has not been fully solved IMO. The description I have given occurred before CWD infestation. I'm sure they are checking.
BTW, I never saw a "river" go underground and keep popping up as a series of separated pools like occurred on the Matador ranch. Also the only place in Texas I ever saw it get down to -1. And, there was a 30mph wind! That was the year trucking stopped on I 20 for two days, frozen to a standstill.

 

[Firebird]

Human population growth has multiple negative effects. More houses, less winter range. More vehicles, more road kill. High population demanding more tags/opportunities to hunt. More people recreating in deer fawning and doe range. Farms turned into subdivisions leaving zero agricultural for deer and other wildlife.
If you haven’t already seen it, get ready, it’s coming to a town near you!
Utah has a roadkill ap so you can report animal vs vehicle collisions. In one day driving two hours I documented 7 buck deer killed-during the rut and in two instances the doe was there dead as well.

Here is a roadkill that already had antlers taken. Not even a big buck-wasn’t poached but that is another concern. Sadly Montana has the same problems as the rest of the mule deer states.

 

[Mountainshadows]

In my area of Montana, and other areas I hunt, the mule deer population doesn't appear to be decreasing. For the past few years FWP has only allowed buck mule deer to be taken and either sex white-tail. You can hunt all season and see a few spikes, 2 points, and a very small number of 3 points. I seen one 3x4 and my friends son shot a 3x4 mule deer this year. The does are everywhere with a bunch of stupid small bucks. At the last 15 minutes of shooting light this season I shot a little 2 point, and by 2 points I mean that is all he had. There was not even an attempt at growth on the other side, just smooth hair. I took him for the meat as nothing else shootable presented itself.
The buck only tag is now starting to show a great degradation in the genetics of the mule deer population. 1000's of does and a smattering of yearling, not so smart bucks to breed them back.
The article mentioned the decreasing mule deer population in region 6 and 7. I hunt mainly in region 5 and 4. I have not seen anything that leads me to believe our mule deer population is down in these regions. What you don't see anymore here are large mule deer bucks.
I had a discussion with my neighbor, a game warden, about the buck only tag for mule deer in this area. He said it boiled down to the biologists and their theory on how to manage CWD. He said that, according to the biologists, the most susceptible animal to CWD was a mature, older mule deer buck. I asked him how many cases of CWD had encountered and he said only a few with them mainly around the Musselshell river area and one from the Yellowstone river area.
Each region in this state is managed differently as it should be. Tag quotas should be hunt region specific and as far as I'm aware that's how the state manages it.
The large part of that meeting discussed in the article was the complaints by residents at having a huge inundation of out of state hunters (yes, that's a whole other can of worms). The last few years have seen an enormous increase in the out of staters during hunting season. Even people who don't hunt have complained about it. It was complained about so much that is one of the reasons the meeting was held and out of state tag numbers cut.
The problem with out of state hunters is caused by bone heads who don't respect the laws and courtesies of the area they are in. No, I'm not talking about everyone or anyone in particular. It happens everywhere. A small number of boneheads doing stupid stuff brings that image to everyone who is in that role. Think of hunters, anywhere, who do stupid stuff and how the population thinks all hunters are like that. It's simply not true, but therein lies the perception. That is the same perception a lot of people have with out of state hunters here and there became so many of them it started to grate on the nerves of locals and complaints were made to state officials.
I know a lot of you want to argue the resident versus the non-resident issues but this thread is about the mule deer issues in Montana. I mentioned the non-resident hunter thing just to bring attention to the article that was presented at the start of this post and that was one of the big issues for that meeting.
I'm not a fish and game biologist but I sure don't like seeing the mule deer genetics to degrade even further.
Just my opinion, your mileage may vary.

 

[Ontario Hunter]

I didn't get my Montana muley buck this season for the first time in many years, since I started hunting them again. I cannot blame overhunting. Shot my buck last year Thanksgiving weekend, the last days of deer hunting season, after six weeks of chasing uplands. I saw lots of deer right up to the end of season. Lots! Not quite as many as the previous two years but those numbers were ridiculous. Montana had a relatively mild winter last year. But deer numbers were obviously WAY down this year. Why? Clearly it wasn't because hunters shot too many. Coyote numbers were WAY up last year (seemed to be everywhere) but a new predator control program seems to have helped immensely. The ranchers in that area are taxed $2/head of cattle and the money funds a helicopter sniper. I only saw three coyotes this year and shot one of them. Pheasants and Huns were up due to a semi-wet summer producing lots of cover = lots of feed for deer. There was a bit of an issue with blue tongue due to the weather but as usual most of the victims were whitetails. CWD? My dogs should have been finding bone piles or I should be seeing sick deer. Did not. It's a mystery. But I don't think it'll be fixed cutting tags. Not the total solution anyway.

 

[Rafiki]

Can Cutting Tags Fix Montana’s Deer Problem?

Western states have a mule deer problem. Deer populations are down across the board, leaving fish and game commissions grasping for means to mitigate the declines. Often, the only lever immediately within reach is a control on hunting pressure, which commissioners are reluctant to touch, as it...

www.themeateater.com

Mule Deer have been in decline throughout the Western States for some time, but what can be done about it?

Hunting pressure is just one issue. Population growth, habitat destruction, wolves and other predators, plus the growth of the Whitetail Deer population all contribute in some way.

A few years ago, Wyoming issued unlimited Whitetail doe tags, and reduced the number of Mule Deer tags in an attempt to rectify the situation.

Your thoughts?

I used to hunt mulely's in the southern Black Hills for 20 years and can confirm that the success of the Whitetail does have a significant affect on the Mulely population. It does seem like licensing to target one population over another would be a very appropriate management tool .... But why would a non-resident go go through the lottery hoops and pay those atrocious fees for a frick'n Whitetail?

 

[dgr416]

I lived in Nevada two years and the mule deer near lake Tahoe got totally wacked by cars and mountain lions .The more they developed the more deer got hit .The tried to make wildlife underpasees but it helped only a tiny bit .

 

[steve white]

So you're saying that we need to kill more cougars....me likey

 

[Ontario Hunter]

So you're saying that we need to kill more cougars....me likey

I prefer getting them to buy me drinks. Spotted a couple of fine ones this past season in Montana at a wildlife museum banquet. Alas, too tired from hunting birds that day to give pursuit. They got away ... as usual. Okay, okay ... they ran away.