Snow moves game animals around
A group of elk crosses the South Fork of the Flathead River during April, when there still was plenty of snow along the banks of the river.
Spring big-game surveys conducted by state biologists produced better-than-expected winter survival, but heavy mountain snowpack did move animals in unusual ways.
“Most of the migratory herds for all these ungulate species ... they migrated down as far as they needed to go,” said Jim Williams, regional wildlife manager for Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks in Kalispell. “This year, most of the migrations were complete. People have been seeing greater concentrations of different types of ungulates in new areas this spring.”
There have been reports of elk and deer being unusually visible in some areas, such as the Swan Valley and along the Thompson Chain of Lakes. That was favorable for the spring surveys.
“Greenup draws literally thousands of deer into visible areas,” Williams said.
Biologists use spotting scopes to count deer and differentiate between adults and last year’s fairly large fawns.
“Size alone isn’t an indicator,” Williams said, explaining how the length of an animal’s nose and ears plus body shape are also taken into account.
This year, there were 6,130 whitetail deer counted across the region, and there was a ratio of 30 fawns per 100 adults. The long-term average is 47 to 50 fawns per 100, so “recruitment” of young deer is still considerably off the average but better than the 22-per-100 ratio calculated three years ago, the lowest since the mid-1990s.
“This fawn survival is basically how many hit the ground last spring and made it through their first winter. That’s the most important winter,” Williams said.
But yearlings are vulnerable in other ways.
“In addition to winter here in Northwest Montana, we have a full complement of native predators,” he said. “So there’s a a lot of factors that work on these animals making it through their first winter.”
Williams said it is likely there will once again be very limited antlerless hunting licenses in Region One for this year’s hunting season because of the below-average whitetail recruitment.
The ratio of elk calves to adults was low this year. Biologists counted 1,387 elk, and there were 16 calves per 100 adults. The long-term average for calves is in the low 20s.
Survey results were worse in some areas than others.
An April 20 helicopter survey of the South Fork Flathead drainage, for instance, turned up nine calves per 100 adults.
“There was absolutely no greenup anywhere during the flight,” biologist John Vore wrote in his survey report. “Consequently, elk were not out and visible on greenup and many were in the timber. This contrasts markedly with last year’s flight when we had good greenup conditions on March 15, more than a month earlier.”
Vore still was able to count 551 elk from the air and calculate the ratio of nine calves per 100 adult animals.
“The calf-cow ratio was very low, the result, no doubt, of a combination of a long and heavy snow winter and predators including wolves, black and grizzly bears and mountain lions,” he wrote.
The regionwide mule deer survey involved a count of 751 animals, and 31 fawns per 100 adults, matching the long-term average of 30 fawns.
And the regionwide bighorn sheep survey produced a count of 879 animals and a ratio of 31 lambs per 100 adults, also on par with the long-term average.
Reporter Jim Mann may be reached at 758-4407 or by email at jmann@dailyinterlake.com.