NEBRASKAland Magazine is dedicated to outstanding photography and informative writing with an engaging mix of articles and photos highlighting Nebraska’s outdoor activities, parklands, wildlife, history and people.
Issue link: http://mag.outdoornebraska.gov/i/581251
32 NEBRASKAland • NOVEMBER 2015 totaled 42,000, considerably lower than the record of 77,000 in 2010. Mule deer buck harvest has averaged about 8,000 per year for the past 20 years, and in recent years, the age structure of harvested bucks has increased steadily. With older bucks in the population, hunters have become more selective than they once were. In 2014, 80 percent of the mule deer bucks harvested were age 2½ or older and 46 percent age 3½. Just 10 years ago the percentages were 63 and 21, respectively. Even in what some consider the heyday of mule deer in the state, the 1960s and 1970s, less than 40 percent of the bucks harvested were age 2 or older. Most of the mule deer harvest comes from the 10 management units that cover the western two-thirds of the state. In all but four units, mule deer doe harvest is not allowed except by hunters with landowner or statewide youth permits. In theory, the population as a whole should grow in these units, and the number of mature bucks should grow if buck permits are unchanged. In five management units in eastern Nebraska considered on the edge of the mule deer's range, however, that growth has not been seen despite restrictions on doe harvest for most of the past two decades. One of those units, the Keya Paha unit in north-central Nebraska, was the first to test species-specific harvest regulations in 1971. After several years of not allowing mule deer doe harvest on firearm permits, biologists didn't see the increase in mule deer buck numbers they had hoped for. The restriction did work as intended when reinstituted in 1999, with herd growth allowing buck harvest to increase to a record 424. But numbers soon began to drop, and have continued to do so, falling to a 20-year low of 145 despite doe harvest averaging fewer than 20 per year for the past 16 years. This decline, according to biologists, indicates there are other factors inhibiting mule deer populations, with habitat loss to grassland conversion and tree encroachment being the likely culprits. The situation is the worst in the Republican management unit in south-central Nebraska, where mule deer harvest has plummeted from 855 in 1997 to 87 last year, with most of those coming from the western edge of that unit. The Calamus East, Loup East, Keya Paha and Missouri units have all experienced a recent downward trend in buck harvest after reaching record harvests in 2008. Doe harvest in those units has been minimal for the past 20 years. The lack of species-specific doe harvest regulations may have contributed to a decline in mule deer in the Pine Ridge. In the late 1990s and again in the mid-2000s, the state was flush with deer and landowner complaints of crop damage. While whitetails were the primary source of complaints throughout much of the state, especially the east and along rivers, mule deer were also causing trouble, just as they had been in the late 1950s. In response, the Commission greatly increased the number of antlerless deer permits it issued, including adding bonus tags to most buck permits. The Pine Ridge unit contains nearly 200,000 acres of public land – more public land than any other region in the state – including rugged, forested canyons in the Nebraska National Forest, several state wildlife management areas and Fort Robinson State Park, and the wide-open Oglala National Grassland. This makes the region a big draw to hunters, including A mule deer bucks sniffs a doe to see if she is ready to be bred in a Sandhills pasture in Arthur County.