N.D. Game and Fish Department: Statewide deer meetings on tap for February

Dec. 15–The North Dakota Game and Fish Department is planning a series of meetings across the state during the second half of February to hear from hunters about deer hunting, management and related issues.

According to Randy Kreil, wildlife chief for Game and Fish in Bismarck, the meetings will be in addition to the Advisory Board meetings the agency is mandated to hold twice a year in each of the state’s eight Advisory Board districts.

“With our deer herd being at the lowest level in 30 years and with all the habitat loss we’re experiencing across the state, there’s a real concern about being able to have a deer population that meets the needs of the hunting public,” Kreil said in an interview. “As a result, we felt it was time to talk about deer, deer management and license allocation options.”

Game and Fish this year offered only 59,500 deer gun licenses, the lowest number since 1983, and some 44,000 hunters who applied for tags were relegated to the sidelines.

“We decided that having this discussion as a portion of an Advisory Board meeting that covers multiple topics wasn’t going to do the subject justice,” Kreil said. “We’re still determining the number and location and specific content of what the meetings will cover, and we’ll be working on that in the next few weeks.”

Game and Fish just wrapped up its series of statewide fall Advisory Board sessions, which included a meeting Monday night in Minto, which drew about 40 sportsmen. Despite the reduction in deer numbers and available licenses, Kreil said he didn’t hear many complaints from hunters at the meetings he attended.

Kreil missed Monday night’s meeting in Minto because of illness, and Deputy Director Duane DeKrey took his place.

Kreil said the most common complaint he’s heard about this year’s deer season has involved how the department allocates licenses. Some hunters have been especially critical of the policy that allows bow hunters to purchase archery tags without the quotas and lotteries in place for the rifle and muzzleloader seasons.

“You’re going to get that if you have 40,000 people who want to hunt sitting on the sidelines,” Kreil said.

While no plans are in the works to change the way archery tags are issued, Kreil said “you bet it will” be among the topics on the agenda during the February meetings.

He said it’s too early to tell how deer hunters fared during this year’s season.

“What I’ve heard from people at the Advisory Board meetings I attended is it’s what people expected,” Kreil said. “The deer population is the lowest in 30 years, but it was somewhat on the rebound. People saw fawns, people saw deer; some deer were in the corn, so success rates in some areas maybe were influenced by standing row crops.

“There wasn’t anybody that was upset with what they experienced.”

Deer study

Kristin Sternhagen, a graduate student at South Dakota State University, gave an update at the Minto Advisory Board meeting on a study of deer movement and mortality she’s been overseeing in northeast North Dakota the past two years.

Sternhagen has just wrapped up the fieldwork portion of the study.

As part of the study, 40 does were fitted with radio-collars two years ago, and 26 are still alive, she said. With the help of Game and Fish staff and others, 20 additional does were collared last winter, with 12 still alive. This past spring, 19 fawns were fitted with expandable collars, and 10 are still online. Collars fell off two others, she said, so 12 of the fawns are still alive.

Mortality resulted from a variety of factors, she said, including coyotes, cancer, ruptured muscles and even a heart attack.

“There was no one thing,” she said.

During last spring’s flooding along the Red River, Sternhagen said a few of the study deer found higher ground on the Minnesota side of the river. Of those that stayed west of the Red, one crossed Interstate 29 and ended up near Minto. The remainder stayed north of the state Highway 17 bridge on the east side of Interstate 29.

The deer moved back to areas along the North Dakota side of the river after the flood subsided, she said.

Sternhagen said the project couldn’t have succeeded without the cooperation of landowners in the area.

She’ll be compiling her research into a thesis.

“It’s been very interesting,” she said. “I found out about a lot of things.”

Other updates

In other news from Monday’s advisory board meeting:

–Trappers took 35 fishers in a season that began Nov. 25 and ended Dec. 1. This was the third year of fisher trapping in North Dakota and the first without a quota.

–All signs point to a strong winter of perch fishing on Devils Lake, according to Randy Hiltner, northeast district fisheries supervisor for Game and Fish in Devils Lake. Hiltner said several lakes in central North Dakota also are expected to offer good perch fishing this winter.

–Game and Fish is proposing to change the 2014-16 fishing proclamation to allow dark house spearing on the Red and Bois de Sioux rivers. Also on tap is a proposal to reduce the statewide crappie limit from 20 daily and 80 in possession, to 10 daily and 20 in possession.