Posted on 12/17/2016 6:26:59 AM PST by BenLurkin
Anyone who has visited a national park or hiked the forests and shrub lands of the West has likely encountered mule deer. Mule deer range west of the Missouri River and are smaller than white-tailed deer, which are more common in the East.
They can be seen in most of Colorado, in the Yosemite Valley, along the South Rim of the Grand Canyon and in the foothills of Los Angeles. Mule deer are often unafraid of humans in areas such as these where hunting is prohibited and interactions are common.
Mountain lions—also known as cougars—take a particular liking to mule deer. Wolves, coyotes and bears also prey on the species. But natural predation is not seen as the leading cause of mule deer declines in Colorado.
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Colorado's plan calls for the killing of up to 15 mountain lions and 25 black bears each year for the next three years using cage traps, culvert traps, foot snares and hunting dogs. The $4.5 million wildlife management plan would then be followed by a six-year study to see how the deer population responds.
There is concern that the CPW's decision is driven by money and a desire to favor hunting, which generates $693 million in annual economic benefits in northwest Colorado alone. Last year, 34,000 mule deer were taken legally by hunters. The CPW gets 90 percent of its revenue from hunting and fishing licenses.
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Mountain lions are a game animal in Colorado. Even though CPW says it has no idea of the population of the species in the state, it allowed the killing of 467 big cats during the 2014-2015 hunting season. Many argue that killing a few more is not the answer.
(Excerpt) Read more at ecowatch.com ...
But yet they get to use bait and dogs and are allocated 4.5 million dollars for their party........
Oh yeah; Lubbock, Tx. is west of the Missouri River on what map?
I’m no expert, I don’t hunt but it would be easy to sell licenses for bear but the mountain lions are hard to hunt because you really need trained dogs to find them. They have a large range and are really hard to track.
My cousin is a government trapper so he often has to deal with problem lions. Several years ago a lion killed a man and it took quite a few trappers to hunt him down.
Around here they just do their jobs and don’t talk about it.
yes, obviously ignorant. The bigger north/midwestern/canadian whitetails are pretty good sized. I have never seen a muley as small as typical Texas/Mississippi whitetails on the average.
Yeah, it just fries my butt. But our side had no funding to counter the slick TV ads showing cute bear cubs while the voice over talked about mean hunters killing their mommy.
Just like the goober mint to spend millions to accomplish what they make illegal then spend million to study the obvious.
Perhaps if they actually read their study they might discover standard forestry practices once used to maintain diversity. That is before they were hired because they were gay, or women or anything else but competent.
Mule deer have got to be the stupidest of all four legged creatures that cross a road. We lived in the Bakken at the start of the oil boom. I swear, there were at any given time of the year 1 - 2 road kill mule deer per mile. Wife & I both hit them with our vehicles. The would be in the road ditch, see a vehicle coming, then just get up on the road surface as the vehicle is passing. Day time they can be avoided, at night it’s nearly impossible.
On the other hand, a white tail is spooked by a vehicle, along with raccoons, coyotes, fox etc.
I just hate the damn things.
BTW, Colorado could save 4.5 million dollars, and maybe make a few by having hunters do the lion and bear thinning.
Is Colorado on Drugs ?
I see nothing wrong with the wilderness being wild. I respect the needs of ranchers and others using the land, but it’s not the function of wilderness stewardship (I won’t call it “management”) to reinvent itself as a game preserve and safe space for hunters and hikers. Real wild is better than sanitized pseudo wild.
Why not let the hunters hunt terrorists?
There you go. $$$$$$ over nature.
Why next thing you know Colorado will legalize recreational Marijuana for $$$$. /s
I don’t hunt and that header made NO sense,even to me.
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$4,500,000 to kill 40 animals? That’s $112,500 each!
Already been said in comments but mulies are much larger than white tails. Another stupid reporter writing.
Also, I saw absolutely no shortage of mule deer on our recent trip to Colorado and other Western states.
The construction of deer fence and huge game crossing overpasses on highways throughout the area seems to be the latest craziness. Not good to hit a deer or elk but the fences are really obtrusive and the expense has to be obscene.
“Friggan Bears do more killing of the deer than the cats ever will.”
Depends where you’re located. In the UP, you don’t have many cougars. In my area of New Mexico they’re abundant. A single cougar will kill one deer about every 10 days, and a cougar with kitten kills a deer about every 4 days. In contrast, the bears around here are primarily scavengers. I mention this about NM because we have similar cougar densities (if not more) to Colorado.
I have a 1/4 acre garden just outside my door. Every year at the end of the growing season I plant the 1/4 acre in winter wheat as a cover crop to turn into the soil in the spring. The wheat is now about 1-1/2” tall and the mule deer ‘discovered’ it again. Most nights there will be anywhere between 6 to 24 deer in there eating the wheat. They’re not afraid. I can run out there clapping and yelling and they’ll just stand there looking at me. Same with honking a horn or shooting a few rounds into the ground. What they ARE afraid of are the cougars. At some point a cougar will come up from the nearby creek and find the deer. He’ll have hit the jackpot of a deer buffet. I can always tell when he’s come around because in the middle of the night I’ll hear all the deer scattering and crashing into things trying to get away from the cat. Needless to say, I don’t go out at night this time of year without a strong flashlight and a firearm. The cougars around here pick off a person every year or so to add some variety to their diet of deer.
The muley’s around here are definitely bigger than any whitetail. I find it pretty cool how the cougars have the strength to drag a full grown mule deer up into a tree to eat, as well as for safe keeping for later meals.
Maybe this strategy could be used in Chicago...
Because big money from out of state environazis passed a referendum to ALTER THE STATE CONSTITUTION and outlaw baiting and dogs for bear hunting, the most effective means to hunt them. Bear numbers have exploded since. So now government employees use bait and dogs to thin the populations.
That fact was tickling the edge of my consciousness. There is a similar problem in California.
“Progressives” have found a chink in the checks and balances of states, and it is that big money can buy referendums, especially when the ubiquitous establishment media is in favor.
Some really, really stupid stuff gets passed, and is very hard to get rid of.
The Colorado hunting example is a good (horrible) one.
Yes. It’s not that they assed a law, they amended the Constitution with a vote of 50% +1 to ass it. I don’t know how we could pass a new referendum to undo it now because they’ll be back with the cute baby bear ads.
How stupid to put wildlife management rules in the Constitution.
I've seen both in N.W. Kansas and they seemed to be the same size to me too.....I used to laugh when the mulies hopped away......
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