North Dakota is currently a State without Wolves.....With this carnivore absent, we see once again that severe winter weather is always the key criteria on how a deer herd fares from season to season..............Up to 50,000 less deer licenses will be issured in 2012 due to harsh winters in 2009 aND 2010............Fawn recruitment will likely tick up this Spring as the abnormal warmth of Winter 2012 gave the deer a chance to "catch their breath"........And back in the day when in addition to severe winters, Wolves, Pumas, Griz and Black Bears were on the North Dakota landscape,,,,,, deer were less in numbers and the land was healthier for it............The deer never went extinct and neither did the wolves, pumas and bears............We are the ones creating aberrant deer density levels and claiming that those levels are postive and sustainable---SO VERY WRONG WE ARE!

North Dakota Deer License Reduction                 

Alexander Gorney;kfyrtv.com

Deer hunting is a tradition in North Dakota but the fight for deer licenses could be intense this year. Game and Fish is reducing the number issued by nearly 50,000.

Hunters like Greg Gere may be out of luck this deer hunting season.

"Well, you know over the years we`ve enjoyed some great hunting opportunities in this state and in 2009 and 2010 we had some pretty heavy winters and following this heavy winter it was pretty evident that those deer numbers were way down. We really had to hunt hard to find our deer."

North Dakota Deer in heavy 2009 and 2010 Winter snow

The North Dakota Game and Fish Department is going to make that hunt even harder. Officials for the department announced this week that they are going to offer only 65,000 deer tags this season. That`s a 45,000 tag drop-off from last year and the lowest since 1992.

"The main reasons for that are that we`ve had three very difficult winters in a row prior to this one of course that caused a lot of adult mortality and it also caused low fawn production the subsequent springs," said Randy Kreil with ND Game and Fish.

Game and Fish offered a record 149,000 deer tags in 2008, but they reported a considerable drop in hunting success since. This year`s mild winter was good news.

"The positive is that we are taking advantage of a nice winter. All the does came through in very good health. there was very little mortality if at all. We should have a very outstanding reproductive effort by the deer this spring and that will help us rebound the overall population much quicker," Kreil said.

Deer might be a tougher hunt this year, but Gere has other options.

"I`ll probably spend more time hunting birds, water fowl hunting is outstanding."

Plenty of other hunting licenses are available, but Kreil says if you are lucky to draw a deer tag this year, expect to only get the one license. Deer hunting season starts in late October.