Mule deer opportunity?
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huntin24/7
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I love the youth season and have had a great time taking my kids out for it, but I’ve never felt that there wouldn’t be plenty of opportunity for them if there wasn’t a designated youth season. I also don’t feel like it’s necessary to have deer season over thanksgiving either. Any college kid, high school kid, or adult will find time to get a deer if it’s important to them or their family whenever that season may be. Not sure why it’s so important to try to accommodate every one. You’d think shooting a deer is the only outdoor opportunity in the fall in the entire state with how adamant so many are that we need almost 3.5 months to kill one between all the seasons.
It needs to end altogether. I don’t understand the mindset of if you see something it needs to die. I also don’t understand the mindset of people that don’t put the resource above vacation days. There is a lot of ways to enjoy Mother Nature without shooting something. There is a lot of greed and selfishness blocking any positive changes for Montana’s wildlife. Besides elk on private we aren’t getting a lot of wins in this state.
Archer86
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The other great youth nr opportunity in Montana is the fact when I have a tag i can buy my kid a nr tag otc outside the draw it's great
Yeah I saw the speed hunting and brown it’s down road hunting at last light on the close of youth season. Was that you? Minnesota? Heck of a way to teach your kids to hunt the right way.
Irrelevant
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That's a really good video that everyone should watchI suddenly remembered this video put out by the Idaho Fish and Game earlier this year as a part of a larger series on Mule Deer Management. They pull information from studies done all over the west. There are many interesting and sometimes counterintuitive findings about how different managment strategies impact deer herds, Buckoe ratios, Fawn
Time Stamp 2:20
This chart shows a comparison of B : D ratios in Colorado and Montana between limited hunts and general hunts. It is no surprise that B : D ratios are higher in the limited hunts. That’s good right? Well, maybe.
Time Stamp 3:07
This chart shows B : D ratios in a handful of Idaho units and also compares limited units to general units. As expected, the limited hunts have higher B : D ratios, although in some cases it is not a dramatic difference. The biologist takes the time to mention that the average B : D ratio in the general units is 23:100. The average in the limited hunts is 29:100.
That seems like a small difference considering the amount of opportunity that is sacrificed. Of course, specific units are higher or lower than those averages and a case-by-case analysis would be necessary to determine if each individual limited entry hunt is worth keeping around.
Time Stamp 5:40 – 6:45
It is worth listening to this entire section. Here the IDFG biologist compares a general season structure to a limited season structure and how it affects hunter numbers, total buck harvest and trophy buck harvest. (The only measurable metric of trophy quality is %4 pt in the harvest. While not exact, and not all 4 pts are trophy size, it does provide a trend line).
It is no surprise that the limited scenario has higher success rates. However, look at how many 4-pt bucks are harvested in each scenario, it is nearly the same. The only thing that the limited scenario accomplished was to prevent 3,750 people from the opportunity to hunt and takes away the ability to harvest 625 bucks that will now die of non-hunting related causes. How can that be? Wouldn’t killing fewer bucks mean more big bucks in the future? The answer is yes but it is much less than you might think. The biologist explains this in subsequent slides.
Time stamp 7:19
This slide discusses mule deer buck survival rates and demonstrates why you can’t “bank” or save yearling bucks for the future. It is important to understand that the survival rates used in this slide are based on non-hunting related mortality. The biologist’s example uses a year class of 1.5 year old bucks numbering 5,500 individuals, only 2,750 will live to age 2.5. That is to say that half will die between age 1.5 and 2.5. Hunting harvest is compensatory to that mortality. Meaning that hunting does not increase that number. Those bucks are going to die anyway, so hunters might as well be the ones killing them.
In the example shown in the slide, a trophy management plan would prevent the harvest of 3,500 bucks from that age class that won’t live to reach trophy size anyway. It means that we force thousands of hunters to sit out for a minor improvement in numbers of older bucks.
Time Stamp 9:00
This slide shows the average B&C score of bucks from age 1.5 to age 10. The curve is basically flat after age 4.5. Managing for bucks older than 4.5 does not have any appreciable impact on trophy size. I would love for Idaho to start a program of aging as many harvested deer as possible.
Time Stamp 9:35 and 10:13
Now this one is interesting. It is based on a Colorado study linked below that also came up recently in another thread. This study found in multiple different units and trophy management scenarios that high B : D ratios had a negative impact on fawn:doe (F : D) ratios. Meaning that herd productivity goes down as B : D ratios go up. The reduction observed in Colorado was as high as a 7 fawns per 100 does. Environment is still the highest predictor of herd productivity but this indicates that managing for high B : D ratios will actually reduce fawn production. How much does 7 fawns per 100 does every year matter in the long run? Is it a lot? I’m not sure but it isn’t nothing.
https://nsojournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.2981/wlb.00012
Gerald Martin
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cgasner1
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I’d also add there is a lot of jealousy. That’s the other problem with any idea. Well if I was so and so I’d just do this. Na mf’er you had 6 months to kill a elk last year and didn’t punch a tag maybe worry about your own license and not what the other people are doing
The_Coloradoboy
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I grew up in the early 2000s era of Colorado…. Here’s my first buck at 12 years old back in 04
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The_Coloradoboy
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75 percent of Wyoming outside Region G and H is pretty much road hunting for muleys….
Archer86
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What does that have to do with the fact that I hunt from horses?
The_Coloradoboy
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Apologies, I didn’t read through the prior posts. I read it initially as “eveyone hunts muleys horseback in Wyoming”
antlerradar
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Here is the story on my 97 buck. I first found this buck in 95, it was in Nov and he was hanging out with some does on private land near the river bottom. He was a 170 class buck with kickers. He wasn't too far to public and a friend and I half halfheartedly hunted him but he never left the private and besides there was better bucks to hunt. That winter I found him close to five miles off the river on the public. In 96 I saw him one time and I didn't get that good of a look. It was just before the season opened, he was by himself and he was leaving the public right at dark to get a meal of alfalfa. All I know is he was quite a bit bigger and he had several more small NT points to go with the matching kickers that were now six inch hooks. Ninety six was also the first year the private ranch that he rutted on was leased to an outfitter. Chances were good that he would not make the season rutting with the does on the private, but mother nature intervened. The winter of 96 started opening day, we were slammed with a foot and a half of snow and as a result the does left the private hay field and went to winter range back in the rough hills on the public. I hunted him a few times but never found him and with all the snow it wasn't easy to even get to the public he was on.
The winter of 96/97 was a tough one, A foot and a half of snow in Oct and that snow and an plenty more was still on the ground well into April. Much harder on deer then the more recent tough winters where the bulk of the snow fell after the first of the year. In terms of a deer killer 96 was second only to 78.
In 97 I found the big buck in a bachelor herd of 8 to 12 bucks depending on the day miles off the river on public that summer. The winter had taken a toll and it showed up with smaller antler, but he was still easily the best buck in the bunch. Three of the other bucks were nice bucks in the 150 to 160+ range. I started hunting him opening day and it was not easy. The bachelor herd had broken up and the bucks were now by themselves in the timber. Combine that with the down numbers dew to the winter and there was a few days I did not see a deer on the public. If I turned my binoculars toward the river, there was plenty of does and small bucks to be seen. It was a day early in Nov and I once again making the hike back into the public. At first light I spotted one of the other nice bucks down on the private checking out the does. The rut was going to start soon. The rest of the morning was uneventful and by afternoon I was still hunting along a bench, then all of a sudden there he was 200 yard below me. I felt very lucky to get such a nice buck on a year with such low deer numbers. By the end of the season the outfitter had all three of the other nice bucks loaded whole in the back of the pickup. Looking back, the hunting was pretty good compared to now. Numbers now are much worse, even the good years of 18 and 19 were not that much better then 97. This buck also went a long way in shaping my reasoning on changing the season to more of an Oct based season. I kept coming back to the question, Is Montana's public best served by holding the season during Nov, when bucks like the one I shot spend 11 mouths of the year on public and the month of Nov were only a select few have access to hunt them. Even though I am part owner of a ranch very similar to the one I shot and many others like him rutted on, I could just not answer that question with a yes in good conscience.
antlerradar
Well-known member
Actually, Currently I am not all that concerned if more deer survive or if they get shot. It is highly likely that we will shoot just as many bucks with and Oct season as we do with and Nov season. We may just change where they are shot and who gets to shoot them. I find it absurd that we are holding the season when it is so advantageous to landowners like me that have large herds of does on river and creek bottom hay field in Eastern Montana and billionaire landowners in western Montana that own winter range at the bottom of the mostly public land mountains. People get all up in arms about the landowner tag programs of late, and rightful so, but the amount of money landowners make off of those programs is pocket change compared to the amount of money transferred to landowners by holding the season during November. We have spent millions on trying to gain access to places like mine, I am all for spending even more, but the reality is for every step forward taken on access we have lost two or three. We are effectively running north on south bound train. Far more effective to change the season to when more of the deer or living on property we have access to then to try to buy our way on to places that will never allow access. Hunters need to give up on the idea that some how there is a magic bullet that will get back the access I enjoyed when I first started hunting in the seventy's. It is not going to happen.
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El Jason
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With respect to genetics, I do think there is a nutritional or genetic factor limiting the antler growth of MT mule deer. Lead poisoning is part of it, but I don’t believe it’s all of it.
I spent a ton of time on some private ranches in R4, that have tremendous deer habitat. By simple virtue of limited access, the should be growing deer at close to maximum potential for MT mule deer. Yet, the biggest deer I can remember was a low to mid 190s class deer.
Compare that to the high country bucks of WY and CO and there has to be some limiting factor beyond Noslers.
I spent a ton of time on some private ranches in R4, that have tremendous deer habitat. By simple virtue of limited access, the should be growing deer at close to maximum potential for MT mule deer. Yet, the biggest deer I can remember was a low to mid 190s class deer.
Compare that to the high country bucks of WY and CO and there has to be some limiting factor beyond Noslers.
antlerradar
Well-known member
I don't disagree with any of this. I am however hopeful that ending the public land doe tags will make a difference. Thank You MOGA. I to am also worried that as soon as deer numbers start to recover, the tags will once again flow like spring run off. I am not aganst doe tags, but the days of 11,000 region 7 doe tags with zero resticions on where they are filld needs to be a thing of the past.
