Breaks mule deer

brockel said:
If the grass hadn’t been green I’d have said that was the blm and state land in region 7. Short enough for it.
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Well it definitely ain't the malta country because there is no grass, every single chunk of blm and state was devoured to dirt by cattle and hoppers.
 
EYJONAS! said:
Well it definitely ain't the malta country because there is no grass, every single chunk of blm and state was devoured to dirt by cattle and hoppers.
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Some of the worst stuff I’ve seen wasn’t even grazed. I would lay off the ranchers. It was an exceptionally bad year. I’ve bitched about over grazing plenty of times but this year if the hoppers came through it was worse than cattle. Some spots are ok and and a lot more spots are scorched earth. It’s a survive and advance type of year. Brockel is correct when he says if we have any sort of winter the deer will be in trouble. Grasshoppers literally ate leaves off trees this year, looked like the dead of winter in august.
 
timmy said:
Some of the worst stuff I’ve seen wasn’t even grazed. I would lay off the ranchers. It was an exceptionally bad year. I’ve bitched about over grazing plenty of times but this year if the hoppers came through it was worse than cattle. Some spots are ok and and a lot more spots are scorched earth. It’s a survive and advance type of year. Brockel is correct when he says if we have any sort of winter the deer will be in trouble. Grasshoppers literally ate leaves off trees this year, looked like the dead of winter in august.
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We didn’t even turn horses out in our pasture and it was ate to the dirt. Basterds even ate the needles off our pine trees
AC9E8B37-94B6-4322-9947-152F79E6AC21.jpeg
 
Montana is huge.
Sure, there are pockets of better but the general prognosis is grim.
I'm glad people are finding deer, and the occasional great deer, but still doesnt bode well for the larger picture.
I saw green grass..sprouted from the last few weeks. Too little,too late.
 
timmy said:
Some of the worst stuff I’ve seen wasn’t even grazed. I would lay off the ranchers. It was an exceptionally bad year. I’ve bitched about over grazing plenty of times but this year if the hoppers came through it was worse than cattle. Some spots are ok and and a lot more spots are scorched earth. It’s a survive and advance type of year. Brockel is correct when he says if we have any sort of winter the deer will be in trouble. Grasshoppers literally ate leaves off trees this year, looked like the dead of winter in august.
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I agree I'm definitely not taking a shot at any rancher. They have to survive and do what is best for their situation at the time. So there is no gripe with me about them grazing cattle.

I was more so pointing out how sad it's been since even last year.

It's incredible to me how animals survive is such extremes. Whether it's sheep licking rocks to survive winters, no cattle and game basically eating dust.

Just a real unfortunate site and predicament.
 
10:30 p.m., blowing like hell (finally!), and the patter of raindrops on the camper roof. A semblance of normalcy? I hunted birds south of Malta today in my shirtsleeves and was seriously overdressed. Hard to believe it is November.

Funny how those bugs run in streaks. Driving through Choteau area in early August, my Jimmy was literally creamed by a cloud of hoppers. After five or six miles it cleared up. A week later driving the highway between Ft Francis and Vermilion Bay I ran into a massive dragonfly hatch that lasted almost the whole route. What a mess! Probably should think about removing the radiator and giving it a power wash. The worst part was every time after I stopped for coffee I had to run the gauntlet of hornets feeding on bug goo to get back in my vehicle.
 
This topic has been hashed out a million times and probably will be another million times , but I just cannot understand how Fwp let’s every single resident walk into the store and by a tag thats legal shoot a mule deer in most of the state . It’s clear the Fwp treats mule deer like rodents . Pretty soon there won’t even be rodents . Yes I know lots of non residents hunt deer in Montana too but it’s a limited capped number . Residents do most of the damage . Fwp does the damage
 
8andcounting said:
This topic has been hashed out a million times and probably will be another million times , but I just cannot understand how Fwp let’s every single resident walk into the store and by a tag thats legal shoot a mule deer in most of the state . It’s clear the Fwp treats mule deer like rodents . Pretty soon there won’t even be rodents . Yes I know lots of non residents hunt deer in Montana too but it’s a limited capped number . Residents do most of the damage . Fwp does the damage
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The thing about mule deer is they are a marvelous resource to manage. After the first time, a doe will almost always drop twin fawns. Often triplets. And do it year after year even in harsh conditions. They can be their own worst enemy in that regard. Moose on the other hand can take up to three years to raise one calf and they rarely drop more than one. If they do have twins it's rare that both survive the year. So FWP has a LOT of flexibility when managing mule deer. They can be suddenly over desired holding capacity and require drastic thinning measures. If numbers suddenly fall off (like they almost certainly will this year) it's much easier to bring them back than other species.

It seems everyone wants clouds of muleys roaming the woods and plains, mostly so it's easy to cherry pick big bucks on the weekend. However, many of us don't care to be picking deer out of our vehicle grills all the time. In years when range and feed is sparce (like this year), ranchers don't care to have deer in the haystacks eating up the mortgage payments. My feeling is getting a shot at a big buck should be a once in a lifetime thing instead of annual (or weekly) affair. That's the way it was when I was a kid ... before QDM came along. Hunting for wild animals should be about animals that are wild, not groomed in roadside zoos.
 
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OntarioHunter said:
The thing about mule deer is they are a marvelous resource to manage. After the first time, a doe will almost always drop twin fawns. Often triplets. And do it year after year even in harsh conditions. They can be their own worst enemy in that regard. Moose on the other hand can take up to three years to raise one calf and they rarely drop more than one. If they do have twins it's rare that both survive the year. So FWP has a LOT of flexibility when managing mule deer. They can be suddenly over desired holding capacity and require drastic thinning measures. If numbers suddenly fall off (like they almost certainly will this year) it's much easier to bring them back than other species.
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Wish FWP would manage them, but instead they seem they’d rather just sell tags.

Im not sure I’ve ever seen a doe with 3 fawns in tow more than a couple times….
 
golfer said:
Wish FWP would manage them, but instead they seem they’d rather just sell tags.

Im not sure I’ve ever seen a doe with 3 fawns in tow more than a couple times….
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Yes. "Often" should be "sometimes".

It's been a long time since I have seen anything resembling a shortage of mule deer where I hunt in eastern Montana. 1972 was very bad due to several years of selling unlimited $35 non resident tags. You should have heard the businessmen scream when F&G stopped that! Some years it takes some work to find what I want but still plenty of deer around.
 
OntarioHunter said:
The thing about mule deer is they are a marvelous resource to manage. After the first time, a doe will almost always drop twin fawns. Often triplets. And do it year after year even in harsh conditions. They can be their own worst enemy in that regard. Moose on the other hand can take up to three years to raise one calf and they rarely drop more than one. If they do have twins it's rare that both survive the year. So FWP has a LOT of flexibility when managing mule deer. They can be suddenly over desired holding capacity and require drastic thinning measures. If numbers suddenly fall off (like they almost certainly will this year) it's much easier to bring them back than other species.

It seems everyone wants clouds of muleys roaming the woods and plains, mostly so it's easy to cherry pick big bucks on the weekend. However, many of us don't care to be picking deer out of our vehicle grills all the time. In years when range and feed is sparce (like this year), ranchers don't care to have deer in the haystacks eating up the mortgage payments. My feeling is getting a shot at a big buck should be a once in a lifetime thing instead of annual (or weekly) affair. That's the way it was when I was a kid ... before QDM came along. Hunting for wild animals should be about animals that are wild, not groomed in roadside zoos.
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Where do you dream this s**t up? The problem is that they manage under a blanket approach over huge areas. Sure one part of a region might be mostly private land and overpopulated while the other 90%of the area has few deer. The region might be 200 miles long, but it’s all managed the same. And, a shot at a big buck should be once in a lifetime? Why is it so hard for some to understand that though proper management, you can have decent populations with some older age class deer and hunting opportunity for everyone. They don’t have to be mutually exclusive.
 
golfer said:
Wish FWP would manage them, but instead they seem they’d rather just sell tags.

Im not sure I’ve ever seen a doe with 3 fawns in tow more than a couple times….
Click to expand...
I’ve never seen it and I’ve also seen moose with twins more often than not. Guess I need to spend more time in the woods than 200+ days a year
 
I've seen several does with triplets in the spring but all 3 never survive the summer let alone the winter, the only reason I know is because they're town deer so it's a little easier to keep track of individuals.
 
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