Does Maine Have A Deer Management Problem?: Part II
May 12, 2009
Indications seem to be everywhere that hunters in Maine aren’t harvesting the big body whitetail deer bucks or the trophy-antlered bucks as they once did. The million dollar question is why?
The state of Maine is notorious for producing big-bodied buck deer, well in excess of 200 pounds on a regular basis. I’ve seen a few of the frighteningly large rack of horns Maine produces as well. Al Wentworth, a legend to many around the state of Maine, has kept track of recorded big deer in Maine for a long time and his charts and graphs show us that the number of trophy deer being registered has dropped significantly, especially between 2002 and 2008.
You can read about this and view the charts in Part I of this article.
Lee Kantar is the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife head deer and moose biologist. I have enormous respect for Kantar and the sometimes thankless job he does. Being a scientist is a most difficult task when handcuffed by politics.
As you may know, if you read Part I, I contacted Kantar about these charts that I had received that were part of Al Wentworth’s collection, and asked for his response. In short, Kantar said that Wentworth’s charts seemed to mirror a reduced population in deer not just throughout the state in general but by deer management regions. In other words, if the deer population in Region II went down, so did the number of trophy bucks harvested. Kantar examined data collected by Al Wentworth dating back to the 1930s. He also stated that this same trend mirrored deer harvest data.
If Kantar has successfully determined that the reductions in trophy harvests follow the reductions in deer population and harvest, then we only need to determine why there are reductions in deer populations in these areas. We should first attempt to determine if the Maine deer population is healthy.
Kantar says:
Looking at the big picture, if you analyze the biological parameters of our deer populations you will see relative low-moderate yearling buck frequencies, excellent yearling body weights, 2nd to only New Brunswick in the east, and good size yearling antler beam diameters, suggesting that bucks are getting enough feed to maintain good body condition over time and therefore growth.
Even though Kantar qualifies this statement with, “Looking at the big picture”, it seems he is telling us the deer are healthy and supported by good feed. As a matter of fact, near the end of his report to me, he says this:
In the end what I conclude from the reams of data in hand is that biologically are (sic) deer herd is very healthy, even though in northern Maine we are at a real low point for densities.
If I’m understanding Kantar correctly, the deer we have show all the signs of being in good health. If that holds true all across the state, then why are there so few deer in the North and East?
I decided I wanted to look at some of the numbers Kantar talks about, specifically that his data mirrors that of Al Wentworth’s showing the same decline in the registration of big-bodied deer and trophy-antlered deer.
Before I jump into this with you, there are some things that need to be brought to the front. The data I am going to work with is not all the complete data on deer management. I intend to create a graph that will help us understand if Kantar is correct. I will be using the data that exists on the MASTC charts (big bucks, trophy antlers), as well as MDIFW’s data on harvest numbers and estimated deer populations. I’ll say this again, as I’ve stated many times before. The deer population numbers are estimates. These numbers are derived using tons of data and there is certainly a percentage of error, one of which I can’t tell you. I’m looking to support or refute a trend.
Follow this link to a graph that I compiled. You can open that pdf file and reference it along with my explanation of what you see.
Down the left column are percentages, pluses and minuses. Across the bottom are years shown from 2000 to 2008. I used these years because this is the time period for which I have data on trophy buck harvests.
Just above half-way up the graph, you’ll notice a horizontal red line marked at 0%. This is important. You’ll see 5 colors charted on the graph. Each color represents data. Black = the 200-plus pound bucks harvested. Green = the perfect antler trophy bucks harvested. Red = the typical antlered bucks harvested. Blue = Maine’s deer harvest statewide and Yellow = estimated deer population statewide.
At the year 2000, 0% represents the numbers for each of the categories for that year. I have them written on the graph but let me list it again.
In the year 2000, there were 772 registered 200-plus pound deer registered.
In the year 2000, there were 53 perfect-antlered bucks registered.
In the year 2000, there were 54 typical-antlered bucks registered.
In the year 2000, there were 36,885 deer harvested statewide in Maine.
In the year 2000, there were 291,000 estimate post hunting season deer wintering in Maine.
Beginning at the year 2000, each successive year will show either a percentage of increase of decrease of each of the items listed from that point. Bear in mind when reviewing the trends the graph show, that trophy information is accurate, as is the number of deer harvested state wide. The data used for deer populations are estimates but those estimates are derived using basically the same formulas for each season.
There is nothing here that would indicate to me anything different than what Kantar said and that’s that the trophy deer registrations matched by trend that of deer harvest and estimated deer population. What I don’t have here is a break down of region, Wildlife Management District or town. I also am waiting to see if I can get some data that might show sudden drop offs in trophy buck registrations in localized areas that traditionally yield large deer. But if the graph is an accurate indication and the trends remain relative, if trophy bucks taken in traditional areas dropped off, then we would have to conclude they went up someplace else. We are however not talking about huge numbers of trophy deer.
I tend to have to agree with Kantar that if his assessment is that the deer are healthy and reduced numbers of registered trophy deer matches the same reduction in harvest and general estimated deer populations, then we need to find those areas where deer densities are awful and find out why and what we can do about it.
In Part III, I’ll take a look at that. We can get a sneak into something that Kantar said.
Over this time period buck mortality has increased by all causes in each Region, but the hunting mortality part of this probably has not.
The time period he was referring to was from the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s. Buck mortality has increased since the 1980s but mortality by hunting has not and our deer populations in some areas are shrinking. Why?
Tom Remington
Deer hunting in Maine is getting nearly impossible, especially in the south. Yes, there are a lot of deer here, but getting to them is not possible in most cases. I have been hunting since 1976, and over 90% of the land I hunted back then is either developed, cleared, or posted now. Unless you are a large landowner or have permission from one to hunt their land, there is just no access to good hunting areas anymore. I will most likely not even purchase a license next year, my last good spot was cleared and posted this year when the original landowner sold the property to someone from Massachussets. There are so many out-of-staters that have moved in who have no respect for Maine’s open land tradition. They don’t hunt, and will never let anyone hunt their land. The land that is avialble to hunt has been cleared so many times that there is just not enough cover for deer, and the swamp areas that have not been cleared have been over-run with moose. It is a joke that the State wants us to spend more and more every year on licences, permits and fees, to hunt less and less land. I give up!!
kantar should not be using 1970′s and 80′ for his data on deer harvest number or estimated deer population….back then we only had 26 days to hunt now there is 90 days of hunting and that is taking out the sundays. And he isn’t saying anything about the expanded archry season where you can kill as many anthless deer that you can kill. Tell me this isn’t hurting the deer population. Kantar isn’t even from Maine…..and he is telling us what it use to be like here, the truth is he has no idea…..I’m tired of the lies and every chance they can but blame on something else other then real problem. their poor game management……..
The sportmen of Maine need to file a lawsuit to derail the game commissions controversial deer management program and allow the state whitetail population to expand. The state game commission is using inadaquate scientific data, in determining the number of permits to hunt antlerless deer. We need to halt all antlerless deer permits in our state and stop the expanded archery season ( the unlimited killing of antlerless deer ) Our biologists don’t really know how many deer exit in our state of maine, and have resorted to subjective and ambiquous evalvation to determine deer densities rather than sound scientific and numerical data. Such unconvertional and careless dicision making has resulted in a dramatia and quite possibly an unsustainable, decline in the Maine deer herd
The state of Maine game commission , doesn’t have suffieient data to make credible deer management decisions. There is no legitrimle basic for the allocate of the expanded archery season and antlerless deer permits in 2009 or 2010.Because the game commission in Maine doesn’t have enough data, the ageny has abused it’s decretion in making arbitary antlerless deer permits deisions and violated its legally mandated duty to promote Maine hunting heritage, By improperly authortzing the killing of to many antlerless deer ( the commission ) has improperly reduced the Maine deer herd below it’s natural and appropciale population and as a result has failed to proide an adequate opportunity for Maine deer hunter to hunt deer
Dan – Can you provide readers with links and information to substantiate your claims? I have no information available to me to be able to state that MDIFW doesn’t have sufficient data, etc. If your claim is true, I certainly would be interested in learning more about it.
I agree with Dan for the majority of the state, but southern Maine still does have a decent number of deer. The problem here is that the commission does not take into account the amount that live their entire life on areas off-limits to hunting because of posting and development. The state counts these deer in the total number available to hunt when they allocate antlerless permits. These antlerless permits are then used on the actual number of huntable deer, which is probably less than 50% of the total, so the population in these areas declines much more than anticipated. This is a huge flaw in the state’s deer management of southern Maine. Something needs to be done to open land that is currently closed to hunting – tax incentives for allowing access or penalties for posting, something along those lines, or hunting in southern Maine will vanish.
It is estimated that there are fewer than 200,000 deer in Maine with the northern half of the state having the thins numbers , we use have a population topping around 350,000. Kantar says the deer harvest could go a bunch of drifferent ways…and he right….the antlerless deer permits that was taken away from most districit, was put on 5 small coastal districits……believe it or not the game commission issued 45,385 antlerless deer permits on these districits. This could boost the deer kill numbers for this year, but what about next year. they are more worried about the projected kill coming in lower. Tell me this is good deer management. When the deer are gone in these districit what are they going to do ,everyone looses. The bleak hunting outlook for the years to come will take an enconomic toll on guides, restaurants, lodges, taxidermists,and other who cater to hunters,also the lost of revenue to the state..what are they doing ,do they really care…I wish I had the answer
lets take the blame factor out…,( I’m tired of the idea,don’t let a bad winter go to waste.) or the increasing predation from coyotes,and bears are destroying our deer herd. The truth is if the deer population wasn’t below it’s natural and appropraciale population, there would be a natural balance between predator, deer and winter kill. That is the way nature works, to produce healthy deer and healthy habitat..Hunters need to look at the human factor…to find the answers to our shinking deer herd. The so called experts know how to ask the questions or turn the problem around, so you take your eyes and ears off them. Please remember, we all are born with something, that the experts don’t seen to have ( common sense )! You can’t kill all the does and lambs and have a healthy deer herd and healthy habitat…….truth is our deer are not starving in our forest , but our natural predators are!!!! Our experts have destroyed the natural balance of our forest……(.Ask, the right questions and the answers are there)