Colorado Mule Deer Decline?

[rtraverdavis]

I know what @squirrel has to say about it, but I'm curious what other Colorado guys think about this. The article paints a pretty bleak picture, especially considering the hurt that the new five-year season structure could put on mule deer. Surely tag numbers could be decreased to make up for the vulnerability of deer with the later season dates. What needs to happen in Colorado to conserve mule deer herds?

What happened to mule deer in Colorado and what does the future hold?

Are mature mule deer a thing of the past in Colorado...

www.gohunt.com

 

[Oak]

Lead poisoning can be particularly detrimental to mule deer populations.

 

[HalfAce]

CO mule deer hunting as we know it will be over.

There will still be a couple big boys running around. But the average size buck will be significantly smaller than what was out there in more recent years.

 

[Bigjay73]

I think its horseshit from a hunter who had a less than stellar hunt and is upset about it. I'm still seeing good numbers, and lots of big boys out there. Numbers are down, but not the doom and gloom painted in this article. But hey, if it keeps a few e scooters out of the state, so be it.

 

[30338]

I think the CO deer herd is down. I base that on personal observations as well as those from the serious deer hunters I spoke with last year. CWD, predation, poor management. Doom and gloom, whatever, reality is numbers are down.

Not a lot different actually from our sheep numbers. Yet they keep issuing ewe tags. Odd stuff.

 

[beginnerhunter]

I'm not a biologist but if it's true that the #s are decreasing AND the new season dates will worsen the decline, why are they doing this? The article mentioned elk hunting driving the management decision. But why does CO tie elk and deer hunting together? Why not have separate seasons for each? Or switch to all 5 day seasons so tag #s can be maintained.

@wllm1313 I know u are moving but do u have any thoughts?

 

[LCH]

I'm not a Colorado guy, although I do try to draw a tag as often as possible.

Unless tag numbers are reduced significantly for all rifle seasons, I don't see how the changes in season structure can result in anything other than a younger age class. For 2020, there will be a total of 19 days of rifle hunting during the month of November. My impression though, from 1000 miles away, was that this was the intention from CPW in response to CWD.

 

[Bigjay73]

And different areas of the state are experiencing different things. Can't really lump the Craig herds in with the herds in Springfield

 

[TOGIE]

seems to me the season changes had more to do with trying to improve hunter satisfaction

i can't imagine the new season change will do much beyond potentially hurting age class, assuming tag changes are not forthcoming but i'm sure they are. i would think it's the doe tags that will go first if there is any fear of really hurting the herd numbers with the season change along with some buck tag adjustments to try and maintain quality

the mule deer numbers problem has less to do with hunting and more to do with loss of winter range, migration corridors, and disease

these are all my assumptions at least, which i tend to pull from my ass, so take it for what it's worth

 

[LuketheDog]

I like a lot of the stuff those Brady does, but that article rubbed me as too much doom-and-gloom with a lot of very broad generalizations, I'm not buying what he's selling here. There are several charts in there that show the 3-year increase in number of hunters inversely correlating with a 3-year decrease in success rate, and that struck me as most significant. I think that shows more inexperienced (or lazy) hunters in the field who are just pushing the deer out of places that are easy to hunt or onto private, and therefore reducing the overall success rate. The In Conclusion paragraph was all anecdotal and pure conjecture, if I see something like "everyone I talked to in the field..." or "I saw..." 4 times in the summary of an article like this I immediately question the premise of his argument. That's like me saying "Based on the number of deer I see within 5 miles of my house the herd is healthy with lots of mature bucks and plenty of does and fawns, therefore I think all of Colorado deer hunting has a great future." All that being said, next year the late seasons are really going to crush the mature bucks, CPW knows it, and they're not going to change a thing until they have more data, post-2021...which sucks

 

[vanish]

Further, the tag numbers are not changing.

How exactly does he know this? Quotas won't even be brought to the commission until May. Yeah, if they don't reduce 3rd / 4th season deer tags, there will be trouble. Statements like that put the whole article into question for me.

He makes a HUGE assumption that bucks taken were "meat bucks" instead of mature deer, and that's why the success percentage barely changed. There's absolutely no evidence for this except him talking with a few people, and no evidence that this isn't what happens every year.

Not to mention he's really good at making graphs looks more extreme than they are by selecting tighter ranges on the axes.

Overall, it felt like whining about a tough hunt to me, but, more people will read him than me, so more deer for me, thanks.

 

[Deleted member 28227]

TLDR

 

[nrpate05]

It's an interesting read but I think we need a little more here. I'm surprised Gohunt hasn't posted a video of his hunt. It is strange that last year (or 2 years ago?) he killed the biggest buck of his life (in CO) and this year there aren't any around. My anecdotal evidence suggests that this past season was not bad at all. I shot a small deer, but of the 2 other hunters I spoke with one guy shot a really nice deer in a unit that is certainly not known for mature deer. I do think increased numbers of non-consumptive users are having an impact on ungulate herds and the literature is pretty conclusive about that.

 

[lastlight]

Yea I love using Gohunt but take every article the boys write up with a grain (or lb) of salt when it comes subjects such as this one. Colorado is a mule deer factory, sure its important to talk about the heard health overall but just because you couldnt find a shooter buck 1 year doesnt mean the entire state is on a steep decline now.

 

[Dsnow9]

As @wllm1313 said...

“A seemingly recent development that my FIL started to notice maybe 10ish years ago was the massive number of deer hitting his private land really early in the season. Right around first rifle season the mule deer start to come down in droves to his property and stay till December. In his opinion on his place there is no difference between 2nd and 4th season and most of big bucks have been there since archery season. This is a low lying property, not terribly far from town, it's super hot in the summer.“

Have seen this same thing in a different unit. When the truck roll up the road and people hike in before first lite on opening day of second season. The deer pour onto private. Especially the bucks!

 

[AggieHunter]

While I do live in Colorado I have not had much experience hunting them so I don't have info on current herds and age class, but I do see the negative effects that the later rifle dates could have on mature buck numbers. Without a decrease in tag number, I fear it could send Colorado's deer hunting into a decline.

 

[Bambistew]

He lost me when he started stating "facts" about snow pack, and correlating it winterkill. Snowpack does not equal difficulty for animals, especially in the late spring when things are greening up. On the contrary, it supplies a much longer growing season and emergence of plants with high nutritional value (I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express, so feel free to prove me wrong). What did the fawn count look like last fall, or last spring? After a bad winter, you lose all your fawns, and does are stressed and abort, resulting in very low fawn recruitment.

Looking at the harvest data it looks like CO has hit its threshold on harvest of available animals for a given population. Throwing more hunters in there for a given harvestable and accessible surplus doesn't change the outcome (total harvest).

That said I think the later seasons will have an impact, but maybe not? Maybe wishful thinking, but maybe hunters will hold out for bigger deer and pass up smaller bucks since they think they find one due to the later season.

 

[cedahm]

View attachment 133956
This is categorically false. CPW said at the La Junta meeting they would change due to the season dates, one regional manager went as far as to say he could see some units not having any 4th season quota.

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This is driving me nuts. Jay Scott had a Gunnison outfitter on his podcast this week that said the same thing. Tag quotas aren't due to be confirmed until the May meeting - and as noted above - CPW already said they would change tag numbers.

Yes - there are going to be more mature bucks killed with season dates far into November. Until we see ACTUAL tag numbers, it's just conjecture.

Or maybe the tinfoil hat guys on Facebook are right and it's just part of CPW's plan to end hunting completely.

 

[bigsky2]

As a non-resident planning on cashing in 13 years worth of preference points, it definitely doesn't give me a warm and fuzzy feeling reading that article. I know lots of people think he's just one hunter that had a bad year but I haven't heard anything good coming from Colorado. Obviously there are still some big bucks like Oak's but the vast majority of reports I have heard were pretty grim. I just wish I knew for sure if it was just a bad year or if numbers were truly down. Its kind of a tough spot to be in, I'd hold off on applying but with the changes to the season structure and the rumors of management changing in response to CWD I just don't know if its going to get better.

 

[beginnerhunter]

1. The article mentioned elk hunting driving the management decision. (False)
2. But why does CO tie elk and deer hunting together? (The idea of gaps between seasons is to get the animals to relax and return to public, if you hunt deer and elk alternating weeks there are people in the woods the entire time and the animals will stay on private, elk and deer inhabit the same habitat)
3. Or switch to all 5 day seasons so tag #s can be maintained. ( This was proposed, people wanted some seasons with 2 weekends, especially if you have kids)

View attachment 133956
This is categorically false. CPW said at the La Junta meeting they would change due to the season dates, one regional manager went as far as to say he could see some units not having any 4th season quota.

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Interesting article, Brady cited a lot of numbers... which obviously piques my interest.

My knee jerk reaction is that he's just complaining about not being able to get it done. You couldn't find the deer you wanted to you are grasping at any straw possible to explain it away. He says anecdotally he has heard from a lot of other hunters with the same complains, do you think someone who killed a great deer is going to come forward or keep their lips shut and say, "Yep state sucks don't go".

That being said, biologist in several regions have noted herd decline.

I am an adult onset hunter but my in-laws have been chasing deer in Colorado for several generations. It's interesting to hear how their experiences have changed over time; no deer or elk but tons of sheep-> tons of mule deer 3 bucks a person-> elk came back deer decreased a lot -> average deer hunting (present)

A seemingly recent development that my FIL started to notice maybe 10ish years ago was the massive number of deer hitting his private land really early in the season. Right around first rifle season the mule deer start to come down in droves to his property and stay till December. In his opinion on his place there is no difference between 2nd and 4th season and most of big bucks have been there since archery season. This is a low lying property, not terribly far from town, it's super hot in the summer.

This buck was on their property starting ~aug 9th
View attachment 133928

Here are several other bucks that came down around the same time.
View attachment 133929

I have no idea if that is representative of the state... I do wonder if increased numbers of non-consumptive users have pushed the deer out during the summer? I don't think it's a coincidence that this year a 5pt resident 6+pt NR early season unit had 60-70% of its tags returned and in that unit the USFS went to a permit system for backcountry camping.

I pulled a tag for ^ that unit and got my butt handed to me. I shot a small buck on the last day, I know that a guy that is a friend of a friend shot a stud a couple drainages over. I don't think my lack of success was due to deer being pushed out of the high country early, I do think lots of deer were, but I think there were still tons of good bucks up there and that I just didn't scout enough, didn't know how to e-scout that habitat, picked a bad spot, and generally speaking didn't devote enough time to the hunt. 100% on me, I learned a ton and had a blast even though I didn't see a lot of deer.
View attachment 133952

Seriously WTF???
View attachment 133953
What about this buck that some rando lurker here shot this year?
View attachment 133954



Speaking to Brady's aggregate data, he mentions that CO doesn't have mandatory harvest survey's this means you have to focus on the aggregate data not unit specific data. 100% agree.

2010- CO statewide Deer estimate
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2014- CO statewide Deer estimate
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2015-CO statewide Deer estimate
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2016-CO statewide Deer estimate
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2017- CO statewide Deer estimate
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2018-CO statewide Deer estimate
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View attachment 133935
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All manner of take 2015
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View attachment 133946
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All manners of take 2017
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All manners of take 2019
View attachment 133940

Looks to me like CO has had a pretty consistent statewide herd size since 2010 and that likewise harvest rates have been very consistent. Colorado has put more hunters in the field so success rates have declined a bit, but that's how CPW funds our wildlife.

I've posted this dozens of times. CPW is managed as a business enterprise, it does not get state funding the way other wildlife agencies do, it is entirely in the interest of our herds to maximize $. As long as our herds are healthy I see no problem dropping success rates and adding hunters. If CO residents want to change this they can repeal TABOR.

Good stuff, as always. I was less interested in the 2019 experience as I was overall trends, seems he may have been overstating things. Looking at the article again in light of what you said the harvest numbers have held steady (with 2019 as an outlier) even with increased hunters (so success rates are lower). That's not necessarily a bad thing as long as herd numbers are still good. Are you also arguing that the later seasons won't lead to a deer massacre since the deer are already lower anyway?

I'm an adult onset western hunter and sometimes I fear I've missed out on the good times already!