Hunters voice concerns over meager deer population

Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks managers got an earful Saturday from hunters concerned about wolves and obviously depleted deer and elk populations in Northwest Montana.

One after another, hunters went to the microphone at the Red Lion Hotel in Kalispell, urging even more restrictive hunting regulations for whitetail and mule deer in Northwest Montana. Comments at the formal hearing will be considered in adopting big game season regulations for the next two years.

Just over 100 people attended, considerably less than the several hundred who turned out for the 2008 hearing.

“This is a fairly light turnout, probably because we’re not taking comments on wolves,” regional spokesman John Fraley told the crowd.

Jeff Herbert, an assistant administrator for Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks in Helena, explained that the state will be setting regulations and quotas for the state’s wolf hunt in the spring with an entirely separate public comment process. That will depend on the outcome of litigation challenging last year’s delisting of wolves in Montana and Idaho. U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy is likely to hear the case later this month or in February, Herbert said.

But hunters at the meeting were not content to be silent about their frustrations over the impacts of predators on deer and elk populations.

“How do you expect us to talk about the elk population, the deer population, the moose

moose population, without talking about wolves?” demanded Larry Campbell of Columbia Falls.

Kalispell resident Greg Foley warned that because wolves are now widely dispersed on the landscape, recovering deer populations will take much longer than it did after populations crashed in the mid-1990s.

“You guys aren’t managing the deer population, the federal government is managing the deer population,” said Terry Zink, a hunter and houndsman from Martin City. “The wolves are controlling our deer and elk populations right now.”

Jim Satterfield, Region One supervisor for Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, said last season’s hunt was a success and the department is in the legal fight to ensure there will be future seasons.

“Frankly, in terms of a wolf hunt, you’re preaching to the choir,” he said. “We want a wolf hunt too.”

Most of the hunters who spoke said they have seen obvious declines in areas where deer used to be plentiful.

“We just do not have any deer out there,” said Cecil Noble, a long-time outfitter.

Noble said he used to routinely see 25-30 deer near his home on Patrick Creek west of Kalispell, but now he scarcely sees a handful.

“It’s pathetic out there,” he said. “I cannot imagine shooting more does.”

Last year, the department enacted emergency regulation changes in response to game surveys showing that the region’s whitetail population was at its lowest since 1997. More than 5,000 antlerless “B-tags” were issued in the region in 2008, but that was scaled back to no more than 25 B-tags in most of the region’s hunting districts. A regulation allowing for hunters to shoot does in the first two weeks and the last four days of the season was changed to allow doe hunting only during the first two weeks.

Nearly every hunter who spoke said the two-week provision should be eliminated along with all doe hunting in the region.

“I don’t know of any hunter who isn’t concerned about the long-term prospects of hunting,” said Dale Williams, a former Flathead County commissioner.

Williams said it “absolutely ridiculous” to have two weeks of whitetail doe hunting when the population is as depressed as it is.

Chuck Hunt, president of Flathead Wildlife Inc., said the rod and gun clubs membership is opposed to any doe hunting at the beginning of the season.

Several hunters said the state should be managing deer populations with different hunting regulations for different areas. Two Thompson Falls hunters said there are more abundant populations on private lands in their area that would allow for more liberal hunting opportunities compared to public lands.

There were comments on a variety of other proposed regulations, some of them statewide, that will be considered for adoption by the Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks Commission on Feb. 11. Bob Ream, the commissioner representing western Montana, was unable to attend Saturday’s hearing because of a schedule conflict, Fraley said.

Comments on proposed regulations can be submitted online through the department’s Web site at:

http://fwp.mt.gov