There is no doubt that under certain stressed situations, predators like wolves, cougars, bears and coyotes can be limiting agents on prey populations. However, we must remember that our hoofed browsers and meat eaters have "walked the walk" and "danced the dance" of hunter and hunted for millenia and that while there are ups and downs due to disease, severe winters and droughts, a balance with up and down spikes does come to play out .................Elk populations in Montana doing fine during the 2010 hunting season just concluded despite wolves back on the ground.............Same for deer in Vermont and New Hampshire.............Eastern Coyotes(coywolves) have not put the herds into a freefall.................You cannot really be a lover of the land if you only want certain animals present and not others.................This blog roots for both predator and prey to be present and to thrive into the forever!

MONTANA 2010 ELK HUNTING SEASON SURPASSES THE MOST RECENT 6 YEAR AVERAGE......WHITE TAIL DEER POPULATIONS VERY STABLE

 

According to data collected at seven hunter check stations operated by Montana Fish Wildlife and Parks, the 2010 elk harvest in southwest Montana was up compared to 2009′s and also surpassed the six year average. This year 12,019 hunters passed through the seven check stations with 778 elk, 212 mule deer, and 101 white-tail deer. Overall, just over 9 percent of hunters passed through with game.

Along the Rocky Mountain Front, the area known as Region 4 had an even more impressive number of elk harvested during the last eight days of the season.  Brent Lonner, a wildlife biologist with Montana Fish Wildlife and Parks, stated that "approximately 50 percent of the entire elk harvest for all HD's in Region 4 occurred the last eight days of the season."  Even with these impressive elk numbers, the season overall just barely surpassed the average for Region 4.

.Whitetail deer show no signs of continual decline across northwest Montana. Bucks checked at most station have either stabilized or increased despite a drop in hunter numbers this year. A report from Fish Wildlife and Parks says that biologists in northwest Montana will be verifying the age classifications of checked deer which will provide a clearer picture of population trends.

Closer to home in western Montana, elk numbers closely compared with last year's. Meanwhile, white-tailed deer numbers were up 30 percent and mule deer numbers were down 22 percent from 2009. Regional hunter numbers were down most markedly at the Darby check station where 2000 fewer hunters passed through in 2010 vs 2009.

One thing is certain – Mother  Nature came to the rescue the last 10 days of the season. Many of those willing to brave the snowy and cold conditions have been rewarded with full freezers once again.

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Vermont Deer Harvest Increases in 2010

WATERBURY, VT -- The Vermont Fish and Wildlife Department has received about 95 percent of deer harvest reports from big game reporting stations. Earlier reports suggested that the 2010 deer harvest would be lower. Harvest reports received by the department now indicate the total deer harvest from youth, archery, rifle and muzzleloader seasons combined will be about 15,675 deer, up slightly from 15,237 in 2009. Vermont's whitetail population is healthy, and the forked-horn antler restriction has resulted in a greater proportion of older bucks in the harvest and in the deer population.

The modest increase in the over-all deer harvest is a result of an increase in the buck harvest during the 16-day rifle season, projected to be about 6,775 rifle bucks compared to 6,017 in 2009. The other projected 2010 deer harvests are: 2,975 deer in archery season; 1,725 on youth weekend; and 4,200 during muzzleloader season. The total antlered buck harvest for all seasons is projected to be about 8,775 bucks which is very close to what the department expected.

Although most big game check stations have returned their reports to the department, harvest results will remain preliminary until all reports have been received. Final harvest numbers should be within five percent of the above projections. The department expects final results to be available in January. A detailed annual deer harvest report will be available on the department's website (www.vtfishandwildlife.com) by early March. On the department website under "Hunting and Trapping," click on "Big Game" and then on "Big Game Harvest Reports."

Hunters continue to provide the means for managing Vermont's white-tailed deer populations across the state. Post-hunt deer densities in most regions of the state remain at levels within management objectives set forth in Vermont's new big game plan for 2010–2020, also available on the department website. There are regions in the state where some people feel there are either too many or too few deer. Deer management will always be a balancing act and require a continuous series of corrections to keep deer from becoming too many, thus doing harm the forest ecosystem, or "too few" to provide for the desired opportunities to view and hunt deer.

Based on weights of deer collected by wildlife biologists during the weekend of youth hunting in early November, Vermont's deer herd is as healthy now as it has been at any time since the 1940s when such data were first collected. Deer that go into winter with heavier body weighs are better able to survive harsh winter conditions. Winter mortality of deer in recent years has been a small fraction of what occurred in Vermont from the 1950s through the 1970s when deer were chronically overabundant.

Vermont's annual deer hunt yields more than 8,000,000 pounds of local nutritious venison each year worth millions of dollars in food value alone. The Fish and Wildlife Department's primary deer management objective is to manage Vermont's deer populations to be abundant, but not overabundant, for all Vermonters to enjoy now and indefinitely into the future.

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New Hampshire 

 

 Actual Deer Kill by County 2001 -2009
and Estimated Number of Deer Registered (not necessarily killed there) by County for 2010 Season

COUNTY	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008	2009	2010*
Belknap	433	566	411	554	555	681	771	502	582	594
Carroll	509	608	492	570	498	575	752	436	438	481
Cheshire	821	984	802	927	1,040	1,133	1,284	1,078	1,015	1,092
Coos	890	1,111	1,068	1,008	1,221	1,127	1,215	977	781	820
Grafton	1,126	1,440	1,332	1,357	1,431	1,819	2,201	1,780	1,768	1,300
Hillsborough	1,147	1,439	1,144	1,241	1,310	1,447	1,767	1,564	1,406	1,919
Merrimack	1,038	1,237	1,055	1,147	1,162	1,362	1,616	1,118	1,202	831
Rockingham	2,000	2,212	1,914	1,933	1,928	1,922	2169	1,990	1,722	1,533
Strafford	685	811	677	753	725	884	867	627	637	523
Sullivan	494	681	597	643	725	816	917	844	833	672
TOTAL	9,143	11,089	9,492	10,133	10,595	11,766	13,559	10,916	10,384	9,765

*Preliminary estimated deer registrations at close of the deer season.