Buck to Doe Ratio

[gamespec]

Jim,

 

If the guidelines based on buck:doe ratio indicates that the number of permits should remain the same, and the fawn:doe ratio indicates a decrease in permits, and if hunter success was higher than goals, I ask why are the number of permits in unit 33 being increased by 50 or 5.9% ? Did the WM call for the increase? Did the dept override the WM and recommend the increase? If so, is this in the guise of increased hunter opportunity over the biological guidelines, or can the population handle the increase in permits over what the guidelines call for?

 

Doug~RR

 

This is a very reasonable question. We have many things that are considered in making a hunt recommendation, but the B:D, F:D, & Hunt Success are definately the core of our hunt recommendation guidelines. It would be great if these 3 indicators always pointed in the same direction. They rarely do so it takes a biologist to evaluate how far above or below each population parameter is. The magnitude of the "increase" or "decrease" indicators is taken into account. One thing that operates as a sort of balance is Hunt Success and Fawn Recruitment (F:D). If you have a high F:D one year, your hunt success nearly always goes up the next year because you have lots of dumb yearling bucks out there. Hunt Success is a pretty good indicator of the number of bucks available in the population year to year (if you keep season timing similar). If you have a high hunt success for several years and are running consistently above guidelines for that and then you have a F:D this year that is slightly below guidelines, then the lower number of fawns entering the population will result in less yearling bucks available next year and the hunt success will be expected to decline and be closer (but probably still above) guidelines.

 

This was the case in 33 for WT this year. The hunt success for the Oct/Nov hunts averaged 38.5% and we are supposed to be managing for 15-20% so when we have fawn recruitment (31:100) slightly below guildeines (35-45) it doesn't make sense to reduce permits or even stay at the current levels. We can let more people go hunting in that unit without hurting the population at all and we still will be above hunt success guidelines next year (but probably closer). kwp is absolutely right that it is simply a case of increasing hunter opportunity, but in a way that will not negatively impact any biological parameters in the deer populaiton.

 

The Wildlife Managers (WMs) make the GMU recommendations, but the final decision is not made at the field level, it is made April 21st by the Commission. The WM submits the recommendation to me in the region, I assemble them all (over 40 different recommendations) for Regional approval through the Wildlife Program Manager and Regional Supervisor, and the Regional Supervisor approves the Regional package and forwards it to Game Branch. Game Branch reviews it and assembles all regional packages into a statewide package and discusses this with the Executive Staff & Director in Phoenix and the statewide package is then sent to the Commission and posted on the internet and available for a major internet flaming.

The Commission then reviews public comment before and at the April Commission meeting and decides what the final regulations will look like. There may be disagreements at any and all levels of this process. We are all just parts of the overall hunt recommendation machine. Sometimes I disagree with the WM, sometimes the Regional Supervisor disagrees with me, sometimes Game Branch disagrees with the Region. As professionals we discuss all the issues and 99% of the time we come to an agreement about what to do. You may hear about WM's hunt recommendations being over-ridden, but this is a very very rare these days. If a WM is overrulled it is because the recommendation is not consistent with the statewide guidelines and the WM does not have an argument that will hold up to scrutiny. What normally happens is I discuss a dissagreement I have with the WM and we agree on a compromise recommendation - not what I wanted originally and not what the WM wanted, but something we can both support together as it moves up through the system to the Commission. I pride myself in making sure the WM and I resolve any issues between us so we can support it together from that point on. Recommendations are almost never changed once they leave the Region. I can't think of one example of that happening (although I am prone to the same CRS affliction).

 

This 33 WT recommendation was a compromise that we all agreed was a good recommendation. We were sensitive to the access problems we have in this unit and that is why the Oct/Nov hunts are only increasing by 25 permits each (this will be 23 more hunters in the entire Catalinas and Rincons). There is definately an opportunity to allow more harvest in this unit, so we decided to give that opportunity to the Juniors. We did this so we were not making the crowding in the earlier hunts any worse and because we were below last year's total number of Juniors tags and wanted to offer similar Junior hunt opportunities.

 

There are reasons for what we do and it doesn't center around money, it centers around letting people go hunting with their kids and fathers and grandfathers.

 

JIM

[.270]

oh boy, we got a game warden on here. here is a question i have along the same lines, but a different species. i noticed that the two u22 north late bull hunts are just about double in permit quantity over last year. and this was before ANY success reports from the hunts were complete or maybe even started, there dang sure wasn't any info published in the reg's. and it was before ANY of the winter fly around and look studies were done. what kinds bull/cow ratios and success ratios, etc, etc were used when these hunts were almost doubled? i'm curious as to how anything with any science to do with it could have been involved in this decision. how could there have been any kind of data compiled that would show that all the sudden there needed to be this huge increase in permits in this unit? i'm thinking that it has a lot to do with the amount of cash an elk permit brings in, especially the nonresident variety. but i could be wrong and i'm sure even if i'm right, nobody would ever admit it. i mean i really don't care that much, i'm all for reducing the heck out of the elk herd and paying more attention to deer herd. my kid drawn for one of those hunts and i'm sure he's gonna bust a big one and he probably wouldn't have got the tag if there wasn't a big increase in permits. i hunted with my cousin last year on that hunt. we saw a fair amount of bulls and he was successfull, but i sure didn't see many folks having much success. dang sure didn't see anything that said to double the permits. (it's a little less than double total, but the earlier of the 2 hunts is twice what it was last year) but that was just me lookin' around. but it seems to me, and i admit i'm REAL prejudiced, that the price of a permit has a lot to do with the amount of attention paid to certain species. i had a real interesting talk with a bunny cop, 'scuse me, i mean game warden, a few years ago about the lack of deer in unit 1 and the explosion of the elk herd in the same unit. he started off on this buck to doe ratio being just right and all this stuff, but when i stopped him and asked what the total number of deer were, forget the buck to doe ratio, he got all bumfuddled and decided he needed to be elsewhere. and i'm talkin' muleys here, the whitetail haven't suffered the encroachment from elk like muleys have. to me, the buck do ratio doesn't mean anything, if the total numbers are down and this feller seemed to feel that as long as there was a 5 to 1 ratio things were just fine, even if there were only 5 does and 1 buck left. just trying to get a little insight into how you degreed folks figger things out. enlighten me. enquiring minds wanna know. Lark.