Hunter Managed Herds

[wiscwhip]

Has anyone talked to real estate agents or guys in similar professions? They are usually involved in local groups and should have more local connections. I am going to send an email to our local Agstar guy. He does lending for hunting land, farms, and logging in NE and north central MN. Also hunts about 1 mile away from our place. It would be interesting to hear his perspective, maybe we wouldn't like it, but I'll try to find out.

I wonder if we could sneak an advertisement into the hunting regulations, looks like a chunk of money :eek: minimum of 2k up to 7.3k! Probably wouldn't get the ad approved, but then you could use the rejection as marketing for "What the DNR didn't want you to know!"
http://sledder.net/?wpfb_dl=279

Perfect venue^^^ WB, good luck with that one though!

 

[bueller]

I also think that the complaints from the tourism business in WI held the most water in the state's mind, much more than the hunters themselves. It wasn't so much that people weren't buying licenses and hunting anymore. It was a combination of those people and those still with hope of decent hunting continuing to buy a license and going to deer camp up north, but coming home after a day or two of not seeing any deer yet again.

 

[Bowsnbucks]

This is the first I read thru this thread. I LOVE what Whip said in post #83 !! So much of that EXACT same sh** went on here in Pa. The loudest, bitching mouths were the same ones shooting everything in sight, giving away the meat or throwing it out, etc. But ..... they just HAD to get " yeah, I shot an 8 pt. and 5 does this season " into every conversation. Teen-age, baby-sh** bragging !! Me big he-man - me kill lots of deer. My thoughts are ....... grow a BRAIN and grow up !!! Shut your yap on deer numbers if you're gonna rack 'em up like cordwood. ( I'm talking about the Pa. situation - not every other state. Your numbers may need fewer does. )

This isn't rocket science. If we want more deer ......... lay off the triggers ( regardless of state doe tags issued ), and improve food / habitat. We did it in my local area of hunting among about 7 camps ......... and we didn't need a cosmic genius to formulate the plan.

Just read Bueller's new post ^^^^^ saw the same thing in Pa.

 

[bat man]

I don't think it is as complicated as many think.

Let the public know what the land can support. (BCC, max sustained yield etc)

Let the public know what the land is managed for. (DNR goals)

If the public is not happy with the deer numbers they can ask the DNR where the data sets are that say we had too many deer in the early 2000's, and why we had to bring it down so far. There is no data.

I'm not giving up on public land hunters Art. But the deer will never come back without regulation designed to do so. How can you expect deer numbers to increase on public land if the DNR keeps managing for 9? It simply won't happen.

 

[bat man]

BCC is going to be a hot button issue. There's no way we can legitimately state what the BCC is of an area without a biologist.

If our MN DNR won't take the time to collect/provide BCC we use WI information on page 29. This kind of public info helped fuel the changes in WI.

http://dnr.wi.gov/topic/wildlifehabitat/documents/deerbook.pdf

 

[West Branch]

BCC is going to be a hot button issue. There's no way we can legitimately state what the BCC is of an area without a biologist. Start throwing around scientific jargon without the research based science to prove it and it will be a sure way for the DNR to discredit us.

Start putting articles in local newspapers saying that the Long Prairie area can support 70-80 dpsm and you'll get a lotttt of farmers interested...not really what I'd want.

The DNR will also probably point back to the BCC info they had in the stakeholder packets this past winter:
Pages 14-15:
http://files.dnr.state.mn.us/wildlife/deer/2015/gs/gb4_teampacket.pdf


Reference they linked to:
http://buffalo.uwex.edu/files/2011/01/Lay-person’s-discussion-of-Deer-Carrying-Capacity.pdf

Who will we find to refute this? Mercer, WI is at a similar latitude to areas of Central MN areas where goals are already 20 DPSM which would be 80% of the BCC of 25 DPSM if we go based on latitude. Any bozo can drive around areas of Ottertail, Wadena, and other counties and central MN and tell you we don't have the issues listed here that happen at 40%+.

 

[wiscwhip]

BCC is going to be a hot button issue. There's no way we can legitimately state what the BCC is of an area without a biologist. Start throwing around scientific jargon without the research based science to prove it and it will be a sure way for the DNR to discredit us.

Start putting articles in local newspapers saying that the Long Prairie area can support 70-80 dpsm and you'll get a lotttt of farmers interested...not really what I'd want.

The thing is, if you have that many farms in the area, it likely could support those types of numbers, you have witnessed this first hand when you lived in Dane Co. Now, does one "need" those types of numbers to be a happy hunter, I highly doubt it, half of that would make anyone just about ecstatic with there hunting experience. Stuart, can you explain the differences between the Crop Damage abatement programs in WI vs MN, I know there are some differences, but they seem at least somewhat the same? What am I missing, the WI farmers don't "seem" to b!t(h near as much about crop damage as the MN farmers do?

 

[bat man]

So the argument becomes

'Carrying capacity varies wildly across the state. Statewide it will vary from less than 20 to over 100, decreasing as you move north. It can be averaged, but may not be accurate locally. The only way to know if YOUR herd is in balance with the turf is to inspect browse levels (steve video).'

 

[bat man]

. Any bozo can drive around areas of Ottertail, Wadena, and other counties and central MN and tell you we don't have the issues listed here that happen at 40%+.

Yet the link they reference states the following:

 

[bat man]

Pretty much. Even then there are exceptions...for example I'd say the Perham/NY Mills has a much higher carrying capacity than does say...Marshall, Monte Video or many other SW and SC areas. Simply because there's a better mix of ag and forest (year round food and cover). My part of 215 has a higher CC than does the St. Cloud/St. Joe area...its a slippery slope...which is why many DNR's don't talk much about CC/BCC. I just don't want to get into a situation where our own words are used against us.

Teach landowners/hunters how to determine if they have too many deer via browse level inspections, how to add more food if they want to keep the same number of deer, or to increase their antlerless harvest (when possible anyway) to decrease them.

Last part about teaching is golden.

Really rings with the fact that DNR manages 400 sq mile deer unit by unit, and your parcel may not be representative of the unit. Forest age, ag, % deer habitat etc.

Study the impact of the deer on the habitat and manage based upon that collected data.

 

[wiscwhip]

[


Wisc - talk to me about the WI system. I am told this is the way IN is heading (yep following the lead from WI). I am not familiar with it at all and the more I know now, the better. IN has a big difference in habitat as well - we have some areas of large hardwood forests and hills country, while others are parking lot flat and acres and acres of row crop.

The link that batman posted earlier gives a good overall idea of what data they collect/consider and the how's/why's we use to determine what relevancy to give those metrics in the determination of our herd densities. It also gives a good look at the theory behind deer management in WI. http://dnr.wi.gov/topic/wildlifehabitat/documents/deerbook.pdf

Here is the Final Edition of the Deer Trustee(aka Dr. Deer/Kroll) Report. This is what started us moving toward where we are now. http://dnr.wi.gov/topic/wildlifehabitat/documents/trusteereport.PDF

Here is a link to the DNR website page that contains the above document and many others. Look at the tabs on the bottom, mainly Action Teams and Reports. http://dnr.wi.gov/topic/wildlifeHabitat/trustee.html

Slideshow/Powerpoint overview of the new County Deer Advisory Counsels that talks briefly about their function in the process. http://dnr.wi.gov/topic/hunt/documents/cdacimplementation.pdf

Here is the link to the webpage that the CDAC info is on, this contains a ton of info on the "new" management system. Look at the Find, Learn, Locate tabs for more info. http://dnr.wi.gov/topic/hunt/cdac.html Go to the Find Tab and when you choose the county on the top dropdown, scroll down to Juneau and select it, then scroll down the page to the "Juneau county metrics data" area and open the .pdf documents titled DMU Harvest Information and especially the 2014 Fall Metrics, this is the data we base our quota decisions on. I chose Juneau Co, because it is where I grew up, I still hunt there, and it is an area I am intimately familiar with. If you have any questions at that point, ask away. BTW, lots of info, good luck! PM me to keep this thread clean.

 

[Riggsgwp->]

Pretty much. Even then there are exceptions...for example I'd say the Perham/NY Mills has a much higher carrying capacity than does say...Marshall, Monte Video or many other SW and SC areas. Simply because there's a better mix of ag and forest (year round food and cover). My part of 215 has a higher CC than does the St. Cloud/St. Joe area...its a slippery slope...which is why many DNR's don't talk much about CC/BCC. I just don't want to get into a situation where our own words are used against us.

Teach landowners/hunters how to determine if they have too many deer via browse level inspections, how to add more food if they want to keep the same number of deer, or to increase their antlerless harvest (when possible anyway) to decrease them.

Art
Once this plays out we should consider trying to get the information printed in the Morrison County Record. That would reach a lot of people as the issue is free and it's delivered to everyone with a mailing address in the county, I believe.

 

[bat man]

I like Arts gun control headline idea. Definite attn getter.

 

[wiscwhip]

^^^Not bad for a fish farmer...;)

 

[sandbur]

I feel the BCC in formation will hurt us in this ag state.I have witnessed confusion and concern when this information was presented at a local sportsmens club that I belong to.

Remember our previous discussions about CC . Lots of confusion and hard to explain tot he common man.KISS.

The best approach is as stated above. Look at the browsing pressure on the hunting tract and make determinations from there.

Evaluations of browsing pressure will be different in deer wintering areas and probably need a different standard in the north country.

Or simpler yet, want more deer, shoot less does.

Want bigger bucks, shoot less little bucks.

Want more of both, voluntarily stop party hunting, in addition to above.

And for the rare farmer with a problem. Want less deer, shoot more does.

 

[bat man]

 

[MoLandOwner]

View attachment 6023

I like it!

 

[wiscwhip]

Did landowners in Buffalo County fight with the WI DNR over buck management? Nope...they just took it upon themselves to make the WI DNR irrelevant. Same can be said for some areas in MN.

Just like the landowners in Waupaca/Shawano, did they fight with the DNR over issuing too many antlerless tags? Nope, they just refused to shoot them even in areas with 100+ DPSM. It doesn't matter what the DNR does as far as issuing tags up there, still one of the highest densities of a wild whitetail herd in the world regardless of unlimited antlerless tags being issued.;) As far as those areas in MN go, Houston Co didn't need the MN DNR to put APR's into play, those guys have been doing it right for a long time there as well. It is the other counties in the APR Zone that have benefitted from the rules the DNR have put in place.

 

[bat man]

Rough draft of a Powerpoint ready for input.

 

[MoLandOwner]

I think most people are unhappy with the amount of deer on there property in MN. Need to focus more on how to improve numbers and no talk about how to reduce numbers.

Otherwise good so far brooks!