Montana Mule Deer Mismanagement

[Irrelevant]

View this content on Instagram

View this content on Instagram

Washington’s finest dink killers are back at it. Four more tags to go! Gotta fill them tags to keep the money and free product coming in

I dare anyone not named El Jason to find those on public land in WA.

You are dealing with WA's choice to manage for opportunity above quality, as much as you are Montana's

 

[ShootsManyBullets]

View this content on Instagram

View this content on Instagram

Washington’s finest dink killers are back at it. Four more tags to go! Gotta fill them tags to keep the money and free product coming in

They gotta go fill those doe tags too!

 

[brockel]

I dare anyone not named El Jason to find those on public land in WA.

You are dealing with WA's choice to manage for opportunity above quality, as much as you are Montana's

Do Washington residents have these same arguments about mule deer quality or are they just happy to go to another state and drive it to shit as well?

Sorry I just hate the “it could be worse”. Ya and it could be a hell of a lot better too

 

[TheTone]

Do Washington residents have these same arguments about mule deer quality or are they just happy to go to another state and drive it to shit as well?

Sorry I just hate the “it could be worse”. Ya and it could be a hell of a lot better too

Living right along the border I’ve often joked the best thing to improve Idaho fishing would be for Idaho to build a new lake or two in Washington

 

[Laszlo Cravensworth]

On the topic of data points….

1. Wildlife management policies are largely determined by the managers’ perceptions of the public’s priorities.

2. Current MT FWP’s perception is that there are more hunters happy with the status quo of being able to shoot bucks of any size during a five week general OTC rifle season that spans the rut than there are hunters willing to kill less often for a chance at an older buck. Hunters wanting to prioritize older age class bucks in the post season population are losing the “this is what hunters want” battle.

3. As long as eastern MT is better than other parts of the state for producing what hunters want ( ability to see lots of animals and good potential to fill a tag) region 7 is still going to be the go to spot for a lot of guys. I know that when viewed in the historical context of how good it used to be it kills you guys to see what it’s become. I hadn’t hunted region 7 for nearly a decade but spent opening week there last year and this year hunting with friends. Compared to my normal experience hunting in region 3 it was a welcome change of pace. I’ll be back.

4. Any success in getting FWP to place some sort of regional caps on hunter numbers is probably not going to actually reduce hunters in regions 6 and 7. The reason why is that FWP is most likely going to use current numbers of hunters as the threshold or potentially base hunter numbers as a percentage of hunters to population of deer. When we looked at Hunters/Deer as a potential relationship to set regional caps across the state we found that eastern MT actually has a significantly lower Hunters/Deer ratio than the western half of the state.

5. Resident hunters from the western half of MT are a significant barrier to eastern residents desire for fewer hunters in their region. Some of the loudest opposition to our proposed season structure changes came from western guys who head east for their week long mule deer rut hunt. They weren’t trying to retain their ability to rut hunt mountain mule deer in regions 1,2,and 3. They didn’t want to lose the ability to hunt elk for the opening week on the west side and head east in mid-November to shoot a rutted up mule deer.


There’s some data points to consider. I don’t know how to fit them into a solution to produce older age class mule deer, general rut hunting on an OTC tag and less crowded public land but that some of what we’re working with.

Tenet 7 of the NAM:
Management of wildlife primarily through social science.

 

[Irrelevant]

Do Washington residents have these same arguments about mule deer quality or are they just happy to go to another state and drive it to shit as well?

Sorry I just hate the “it could be worse”. Ya and it could be a hell of a lot better too

It's the exact same, we're just further down the slide than you. Everyone complains about the quality, blames WDFW, but then throws a hissyfit if you talk about taking away their "right" to hunt deer every year.

We're so much further down the scale, we've implemented APR, specific method of take tags, much shorter seasons, and will be going to method and species tags soon. All to keep the opportunity alive, but reduce the harvest to a point where we can tell ourselves it's sustainable.

 

[El Jason]

I guess in the interim, while you folks are working on getting things changed, you might also remember you still have thousands upon thousands of square miles to hunt. Maybe go look for a new experience that isn’t contingent solely upon the size of deer you see?

 

[Gerald Martin]

I guess in the interim, while you folks are working on getting things changed, you might also remember you still have thousands upon thousands of square miles to hunt. Maybe go look for a new experience that isn’t contingent solely upon the size of deer you see?

Do you know just how annoying it is to get distracted by alternate means of having fulfilling adventures while you’re in pursuit of the main objective?

Like finding out that shooting pheasants with your sons in the peak of mule deer rut is more fun than seeing one more forked horn nosing up a group of does?
Total PITA….

 

[brockel]

I guess in the interim, while you folks are working on getting things changed, you might also remember you still have thousands upon thousands of square miles to hunt. Maybe go look for a new experience that isn’t contingent solely upon the size of deer you see?

There’s 11 other months out of the year I can do that

 

[ShootsManyBullets]

I guess in the interim, while you folks are working on getting things changed, you might also remember you still have thousands upon thousands of square miles to hunt. Maybe go look for a new experience that isn’t contingent solely upon the size of deer you see?

We can do that in the PNW without driving 15 hours. OR and WA do hold some giant deer, just not many and not much opportunity to hunt the rut and stack a truck full of does.

Both states are a glimpse of Montana's deer hunting future with their season structure and tag numbers.