What factor or factors have the most impact on mule deer numbers?
Why is it important to know the number of fawns in a mule deer population compared to the number of adult mule deer?
How many different types of mule deer habitat are there in Montana?
How often and when are mule deer counted in the state?
How does FWP know if there are enough mule deer in an area to warrant a liberal hunting season?
Answers to these questions and more can be found in two places Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks' spiral bound Adaptive Harvest Management plan (AHM) and in the field with deer biologists and wildlife managers across the state.
The field may be the popular choice. But, make no mistake, the spiral bound version is very interesting reading.
"AHM maps what biologists have learned first hand in more than 25 years of field work with mule deer." said Glenn Erickson, FWP Wildlife Division wildlife bureau chief. AHM brings annual mule deer surveys, long-term average population statistics, annual weather conditions, and harvest statistics, together with hunting regulation packages tailored to the five unique mule deer habitats in the state.
"For the first time we have the critical causes and effects in one place," Erickson said. "Now we're in a position to learn even more about how nature and hunters impact mule deer."
Annual monitoring of deer populations is the foundation of mule deer management and it helps drive FWP's annual hunting regulation recommendations. Aerial surveys are conducted in 13 census areas (where spring surveys are flown three times to increase levels of accuracy and winter flights are flown once) and 67 trend areas (where both spring and winter surveys are flown only once). The 13 census areas are each similar in size to the Highwood Mountains east of Great Falls. They are core research areas where extra time is spent to collect accurate and consistent data. The trend areas provide supplemental information that help fill in the gaps across these large geographic areas. The winter or post-hunting season flights are flown in December and January and the number of bucks, does and fawns are tallied at that time. Spring flights from March 15 to April 30 reveal the number of fawns that survived winter, the number of fawns per 100 adults, and total winter survival of mule deer.
While the spiral bound version of AHM is good reading the aerial view is where research and reality meet.
