Cranbrook Whities

[horshur]

Cats, not dogs.

All these guys that claim to have watched the Hebblewhite presentation seem to have missed large portions of it. But shit, right at the beginning, the discussion was about wolves' negligible impact on mule deer populations.

Yeh except I watched dogs kill every day for weeks..posted photos on here..sometimes two deer a day. When he Hebblwhite was doing his study were they trying to eradicate moose at the same time to starve out the wolves?

[338win mag]

Wolves kill about 1% of mule deer.

How much money and effort should we waste on that?

Really? when hunting a wolf infested area some years ago I found no less that one dead and mostly eaten mule deer a day, that would go along with a alarming number of piles of moose fur laying where they were killed.
Seems like a low %.

[blacklab]

That's pretty funny, since YOU were the one who first compared us to the US in your post.

Once you got an answer you didn't like, then they became non-comparable.

Only ask a question if you know the answer first.

I was to responding to Ourea,s post, in relation to states adjacent to BC. Maybe check the regs in Idaho or Washington.
These states are "adjacent" to BC the last time I looked at a map.

[Wild one]

Can someone provide an example where this management style was proven to achieve results?

I have seen where this plan was put in place and failed. Mule deer harvest was restricted at the same time in this area BC has not followed this step

This theory may be based on fact and study but without proven results it is only a theory. If we blindly follow all scientific theories we would be fools. Scientific theories based on fact are brought forward all the time and not all prove true.

Those who blindly follow theories need to understand the prediction on the end result is not scientific fact till proven with results. A Theory is only an opinion that was reached with facts and study this does not mean it can’t be wrong

Now I ask the supporters of this theory can you provide results where it was proven to achieve results the management plan hopes for?

[GreyDog]

I grew up hunting whitetail deer in Idaho and hunt them now near my home in the EK. There are almost certainly a lot more whitetails in Idaho today than there were in 1965 (more elk too). Back then we shot either sex and management was much less focused than it is today. Here, on the west side of Koocanusa lake, there are certainly less whitetails than there were three or four years ago. I think there are more bucks and, possibly, more good bucks but the overall population seems way down. Almost every day, year 'round, I walk within a five mile radius, mostly south and west, of my house. This year, I see far fewer whitetails, about the same number of mule deer (rare) and far fewer elk than in previous years. There are no wolves but an overabundance of coyotes. I think cat numbers may be down as well but, truthfully, unless you hunt for them, you don't see a lot. I do believe whitetails have been over harvested in recent years. I also believe that the combination of elk fencing and the use of these fences by coyotes to take whitetails has had a significant effect. I have not seen much in the way of cougar kills of whitetails in my area for the last three or four years. When it comes to local hunters; to me, local hunters are the half dozen or so of us who live here, everyone else is a non-resident!! GD

[LBM]

I have hunter numbers for mule deer, for region 4.

1986 - 1990:

10623
9857
10231
11980
11351


For the period 2012 - 2016:

6457
5982
5656
6366
6777

Looks to be just about half the number of hunters now as there were then.

Showing numbers for whole region IMO doesn't really help has to be broken down to MU for each is different. In your other post you posted the 1981 deer quota for mulies which was 2 but started your numbers here in 86 were it had all ready changed to 1 I believe.

Now since many feel the decline in mulie numbers started in the 80s your numbers actually may show that hunters had a part in there decline. Interesting.

[LBM]

If people want to help mule deer, there are three drivers:

1.) Habitat work (can happen)
2.) Kill piles and piles of female cats to drive the species into obliteration - even this drastic action may produce mixed results as compensatory mortality tends to even things out, unless done in concert with 1.) above. (will never happen)
3.) Shoot whitetails (can happen)

If people want to manage for high whitetail populations, then they will have to make the choice to sacrifice mule deer to do so.

And if that's what people decide, then so be it, but they need to know the outcomes of their decision before making it. You can't have your cake and eat it too in this situation.

Interesting opinion kill piles and piles of female cats to drive the species into obliteration, hopefully all members of the public are aware of what some hunters are attempting to do.

[LBM]

Habitat competition isn't the driver. Nowhere did I mention that.

The driver is the whitetails keeping the predator load high while mule deer are in decline. In a traditional mule deer population absent whitetail, the predator population will fluctuate with the mule deer, giving the mule deer a chance to recover when preds dip.

When whitetail show up, predator populations can dine on WT as a secondary or even primary prey while MD decline, and that keeps MD on the decline as the preds stay high.

Read this: http://www.cfr.washington.edu/classe...binson2002.pdf

When we combine poor MD habitat, high preds, and high WTs, it's the perfect storm to drive MD down, down, down.

If all are sharing the same habitat this may happen , but since none of the 3 you mentioned are being done in conjunction with each other it could be making things worse.
Right now your just killing off the whitetail and cats but the cats that are surviving your forcing to a alternate food source which could very well be the mule deer.
I have seen where having cats and the odd wolf around has actually increased mule deer survival rate in the winters. Not counting humans which are the number one cause of the decline, most mule deer kills I find are from coyotes and typically the yearlings. In the one area we started to see more deer surviving and the coyotes were just about gone the cats and wolves were killing them and keeping them away. Then the rancher came in and killed all of the cats and a few wolves, coyote numbers went back up, deer down again.

[LBM]

Personally would rather have studys showing what happened here, not Idaho, Washington, Montana etc, sure they may give something to go on but could be totally iralivant here.
But in saying that a study now will not show why the numbers started declining we needed things done years ago.
Its not just the mule deer pretty much all species in the EK are on the decline. The whitetails have been declining for years in certain MUs and the doe season did not help them at all.

[LBM]

Wasn't the intent of the two doe limit to reduce the whitetail population?

Mission accomplished so now it's been reduced back to one doe.

Very high populations of whitetail among struggling mule deer numbers isn't good for mule deer.

SSS

Depends who you talk to or what you read, it was even on this site some where that the doe season was to create opportunity and hunter recruitment, people were just not interested if they couldn't kill something.