Regarding the whitetail DOE tags in Region 7, there should be no issue with allowing (non-resident) hunters who are landowners to purchase two tags. Enhancing revenue and helping landowners manage their property regardless of the severity of EHD, CWD, coyotes, drought, etc. should be an easy decision for the Commission. As a non-resident rancher and sustaining such a large number of animals is so disappointing when family members are unable to draw A tags in the lottery draw. There is no one looking out for the biggest revenue generators to FWP and they probably want it that way. Guys like me, wealthy non-resident landowners who do more to sustain the resource than anyone don't feel like letting locals on to hunt when the State of MT won't allow family members to draw tags.
While I am on the subject, as a life-long trapper of cats and canines across many states over the years, it is difficult to justify why non-residents can't trap beaver, mink, muskrats, bobcats. Sure we can pound on fox and coyotes but the lack of access to those animals may do some good and would allow reciprocity for Montana trappers who trap out-of-state.
On my final note, running a pheasant season to February 1 is going to start a beautiful caravan of die-hard pheasant hunters from Minnesota and North Dakota come January. Probably not a single biological reason to not allow killing of roosters all winter, the single greatest threat is of course hunters and dogs beating winter cover to death and not allowing those birds to get tucked in properly when bad weather hits. The local die-hard Montana bird hunters don't usually follow possession limits on pheasants anyway and will get their limit daily no matter what. Enforcement doesn't seem to stop them. My comment is to leave the season alone the way it is. Give the birds a break
In Montana, the Montana Fish Wildlife & Parks crowd are beholden to state legislators, MOGA (Montana Outfitters & Guides Association) and some very large landowners. Their crowing about adaptive harvest management and referencing the benchmark long-term averages pales in comparison to what Colorado does to manage their deer herds.
In Region 7 where my ranch is located on a couple miles of the Yellowstone River, mule deer numbers are dismal. Down and trending lower. In 2020 which was just 700 days ago they issued 11,000 mule deer B tags which invariably means doe tags though they give little regard to the simple fact that half of the fawns killed are buck fawns. A year ago MT issued 5,500 B tags in Region 7 and this year only 3,000.
Deer management by the seat of your pants is what I call it.
Running a season for 6 weeks into the rut is ridiculous but what do I know about managing mule deer? The last mule deer seen on my ranch was in 2018, killed by a shooter who I confronted trespassing on my property gutting it out. The resource is suffering and what is in place today has to end. The usual call to simply "follow-the-money" is a beautiful place to start in setting seasons in Montana. Call me out, debate me, phone me up personally if you think different but you know it's true. The years of pandering to the crowds of hunters, hotel owners, cafe owners, FWP personnel, outfitters, guides, gas stations owners, the gun lobby, the archery lobby, the muzzleloader lobby, the cartridge manufacturers, and on and on and on it goes. The resource is dealing with drought to their feed, hunting pressure, disease, predators, browse, water and on and on and on.
Not certain about what a bad winter might do to the Montana herds but the proverbial good old days are here today and it is not a promising future over the short term.
Owning a ranch in eastern Montana and having grown up there 50 years ago I have a fair amount of personal history to draw on. A year ago I spoke with a biologist in the Region 7 offices in Miles City and told him the numbers I had observed in covering thousands of miles in eastern Montana all fall were way, way down.
I found it odd that his lack of credence in my ability to observe mule deer in eastern Montana was rather short-sighted but one thing for sure, if there's deer there I will see them.
Fast forward to what I was trying to explain to him without any success. Another sad day for mule deer in Montana.
"The Montana deer population survey numbers for 2022 were published late last year and show that mule deer numbers are down, way down! There are a lot of factors to blame, starting with the largest culprit that has been proven by research in many Western states and that is drought. Research shows deer (does) that go into winter in poor shape, with minimal body fat in dry years, have much lower fawn health and birth rates in the spring of the next year. 2020-2022 were very dry years in the eastern half of the state and forage in the fall of 2021 was especially poor when I hunted there. Trophy quality also seemed to be hurt by the drought. In 2022 population counts showed 58,000 mule deer in Region 7 which is down from 114,000 in 2020; that's a 52% decrease!
Disease is also another factor and sure doesn't help the situation; EHD, Blue Tongue, and CWD. All of these diseases have affected the eastern half of the state the last few years. CWD has been the one in the spotlight recently but there's no proof that CWD has wiped out entire herds of deer in the West unless you consider how it has impacted state's like Montana's deer management policies.
Overhunting could also be a factor. Montana gained a lot of residents the last two years and if you don't know, Montana is an opportunity state and is not managed for trophies. It's managed for opportunity, hence the many general tag areas. Basically Montana is a, "If it's brown, it's down" kind of state and all of Regions 6 and 7 are either-sex, either species except for one district on the general tag. In addition there are thousands of antlerless tags available for each species in these regions as well."
I say Montana needs more hunters. They need more "come home to hunt" hunters, more youth seasons, more late season muzzleloader seasons, more military hunters, and more resident hunters and while they are at it, why not extend the cow elk season into April from February 15 so hunters can eat veal from a fetus? I say all of that sarcastically but you know the resource is suffering and low fur prices aren't doing much to cut back the never-ending problem of coyotes on fawns.
I say shut the mule deer season down on November 12th.
Every year.
blog.eastmans.com
