Welcome to the peace

[Cyrus]

they always seem to be in a farmers field....nice bucks.

[Boner]

The winter of 2006 I think was a bad one... Prior to that the quality of good deer sightings was way up there...Nice pic dino !!

Indeed. I was working on a project along the Braden Rd. The snow was too deep for the deer to eat enough. I talked to a CO a few years after that about that winter, and he told me a farmer got him to come out and look at close to 150 dead deer around one of those tall hay fence enclosures.

That winter was probably the catalyst that got the ball rolling for the upswing in wolf numbers in the Peace region.

[bridger]

The fish & wildlife branch announced in 2006 they were going to reduce the mule deer population by 50% by liberalizing antlerless seasons beginning in 2007. The winter of 06/07 was one of the worse on record up here and by spring we had lost 50% of the population. The government went ahead with its plan in spite of the natural reduction and reduced he population by another 50% and mule deer have never recovered.

[eric]

^^^^^ Governments,and wisdom, have never been used in the same sentence..

[hoochie]

I'm heading up to Hudson's Hope for my hunt this year for about 8 days in early October, I'll be sure to post results.....

work was going to send me there in Sept, I was really hoping to get an Elk. Ive never hunted the Peace. But an Elk or moose would be my first. Ive only hunted deer thus far.

[whitetailsheds]

The fish & wildlife branch announced in 2006 they were going to reduce the mule deer population by 50% by liberalizing antlerless seasons beginning in 2007. The winter of 06/07 was one of the worse on record up here and by spring we had lost 50% of the population. The government went ahead with its plan in spite of the natural reduction and reduced he population by another 50% and mule deer have never recovered.

Things that make you go "hmmmmm"!!!! One really has to wonder about these decisions!!
Writing for Big Buck as I have since 1990, and being "in the right circles" in terms of knowing and talking to ALOT of hunters......concensus amongst deer hunters was close to 100% that should have never happened!!!!
But......it did!!
If there was ever a tiny bit of light at the end of the tunnel, many of my hard core deer hunting aquaintances stopped hunting mulies!! And quite proud to say....in terms of conservation!!
And, as Bridger has already mentioned, things are still recovering!!
Long gone are the days of seeing large herds of mulies, every few miles!!

[Husky7mm]

It happened just like bridger said. Been a few long , deep snowed winters since then also. The lastest being 2013-2014. Found deer lying dead on top of the snow in april that winter. They are slowing coming back. Habitat is not the factor in the peace, for the most part its winter. Those there bucks are not really big bucks either, more just average mature 3-4 year old mule deer. Its likely around 2006 and prior that they were past carrying capacity.

[BCHunterFSJ]

It was not un-common to count over 300 mule deer driving from FSJ to Hudson's Hope!
In the last few years you sometimes would not see a single deer in the same drive...
Some very poor decisions indeed.

[Jrax]

I remember how pumped I would get driving that section on my way further north. I would stop, pull out the binos and drool over the numbers and size of mulie bucks I would see. Over last few years I have driven 2x and was very disappointed to see only a few deer.

[meat hunter]

I shot a deuce mulie last year around horse fly never eaten such a tasty deer. Ill take the little ones