Page 61 - Flathead Beacon // 5.25.16

MOUNTAIN EXPOSURE
OUTDOORS IN BRIEF
FWP REPORTS POSITIVE WHITE-TAIL DEER, ELK SURVEYS
State wildlife managers are reportingpositivespringrecruit- ment of white-tail deer and elk in Northwest Montana while mule deer populations appear worrisome.
Deer and elk populations are greatly in uenced by winter and early spring weather. White-tailed deer populations were low in 2010 following a rough winter but have steadily increased over the last ve years due to mild winters and good survival of fawns, accord- ing to Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks. In 2016, fawn recruitment ranged from 37 fawns per 100 adults in the Swan (HD 130) to 62 fawns per 100 adults in HD 170 near Kalispell. Recruitment rates ranging from the mid 30s to over 50 fawns per 100 adults indicate the population is increasing and could potentially double over the next 2-3 years, FWP said.
FWP biologists are con- cerned with population trends for mule deer in this region, and numbersaregenerallythoughtto have declined over the last 8-10 years. Habitat changes and pre- dation are largely considered rea- sons for these declines. Although numbers of mule deer seem to be below long-term average, the 2016 recruitment rates in some hunt- ing districts are encouraging, FWP said.
For elk, recruitment rates were considered to be good in HD 103, HD 121, and HD 123. Elk calf recruitment in the Bob Marshall increased to 19 calves per 100 cows, which is the highest it has been since 2012. Bull ratios for elk in all the survey areas ranged between 11 and 15 bulls per 100 cows in 2016 spring green-up surveys.
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OUT OF BOUNDS ROB BREEDING ILL-FATED BUFFALO
ERESCUE IN YELLOWSTONE
NOUGH TIME HAS PASSED THAT matter the time or place, but we all could we are learning the details involv- have been seriously injured if I hadn’t ing the Yellowstone bison calf that been quick on the brakes.
was euthanized last week following a tourist’s silly attempt to save the shiv- ering, probably abandoned baby bu alo.
For starters, it may not be such a clear- cut case of clueless tourist as initially reported. Mind you, the act of picking up a bison calf and putting it in the back of your SUV so you can hurry it o to the nearest ranger station for safe keeping may be the de nition of clueless tour- ist. But recent reports suggest the dudes actually knew what they were doing wasn’t a good idea.
They were probably acting under the impulse within many of us that compels us to help the helpless. Reports now sug- gest that a number of park visitors were aware of the shivering bison, and video of the calf shows it rst struggling to cross a river with its herd, then barely able to stay on its feet as it wandered along a park roadway.
This leads me to believe (though admittedly, I’m guessing here) that the calf may have already been abandoned by the herd, and was therefore dead meat even before those Canadian tourists took the critter on that ill-fated joy ride.
Gathering up the calf was no doubt a dopey decision. If the tourists had been anywhere other than Yellowstone, the appropriate action would have been to just drive on. The park is a little di erent, however, in that at times in the summer it really does feel like a giant zoo. Visitors drive through the park looking for wild- life, and have no hesitation about stop- ping, anywhere, anytime, when some- thing catches their eye.
I was driving through the park with the Elk Hunter last summer and nearly rear-ended a car that had stopped in the middle of the road — on a blind curve no less — when the occupants spotted a bear. Now seeing a bear is a cool thing, no
Once I realized what was going on I did something I rarely do when driving out West: I leaned on the horn. That fright- ened the bear and got the car in front of us moving so we didn’t get rear-ended by the next vehicle coming down the road.
So what should those Canadians have done after spotting that helpless calf? Drive to the nearest ranger station and let them know what they had seen. My impression is that managing tra c around roadside wildlife is a Yellowstone ranger’s primary job in the summer.
The rangers could have dealt with the situation appropriately, which would have meant making the same futile attempt at reuniting the calf with its herd, then taking it away to be eutha- nized when the e ort predictably failed. They couldn’t just leave it out there wan- dering along the road considering the way Yellowstone tourists drive.
This is the way things work in nature, where most babies are born to be eaten by other wildlife. Too often we allow our- selves to adopt that Disneyesque sen- timentality that suggests every mis t critter can somehow nd the gumption to survive, against all odds, and become the leader of the pack. That just isn’t real- ity in the natural world, however, where mis ts are born for a reason: to be easy to catch so predators eat them, instead of tter newborns loaded with better DNA that needs to be passed along to future generations.
So I suppose those knucklehead Cana- dians didn’t cause the death of that calf. The herd moving on after the river cross- ing was really the animal’s death knell. That doesn’t make the tourists decision any less stupid, but the reality is that that baby bison was already dead before they loaded it into their SUV.
That’s just the nature of things.
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Rob Breeding writes and teaches when he’s not shing or hunting.
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MAY 25, 2016 // FLATHEADBEACON.COM
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