Just for your information-- at the last round of RAC meetings the Deer Plan was ammended so that the number of cougar tags within a deer unit will be determined by the "adult survival" rate. So, specificaly in those areas where the DWR has radio collared deer, they will try to determine how much of the of the deer mortality is because of cougar predation and will adjust cougar tags. Season lengths will be established based on total number of harvested cougars or until a certain number of female cougars are killed. The DWR is truly trying to find out if predation is one one of the leading causes of low deer numbers. They also have bought into the idea that perhaps when deer herd numbers are depressed for any reason (i.e. bad winters, fire etc)that predators may be the major factor in keeping any herd number growth supressed. In other words-- the deer herds are not able to out produce the predator kill.
Saw a report on Kennecott property that a male cougar that had been radio collared and then tracked was killing an adult elk (mostly males) every 5 days. They went out and physically checked an area (via GPS cordinates) that the cougar stayed in for 4-5 days which indicated a kill. I believe they tracked him approximately for one year.
It will be interesting to find out if predators are the main cause of deer numbers not being able to rebound once they get to a depressed number. It isn't that cougars are killing more deer than they used to, but maybe it is because they are preying on a deer population that has become so depressed it needs to have additional predator removal done until the deer population can increase and be able to bear the increase predation by cougars.
Back in the 50's and 60's when 1080 poison was being used there were some harsh winters that really knocked the deer numbers down, but then there would be a huge increase in deer numbers over the next few years. There is a good possibility that the increase was possible because the predator numbers were extremely low then. In the past 3 decades since the ban of 1080 we have not seen that big peaks and valleys in deer numbers. Just maybe it is because of predators-- coyotes included, that we don't get the recovery in deer numbers we used to.
Saw a report on Kennecott property that a male cougar that had been radio collared and then tracked was killing an adult elk (mostly males) every 5 days. They went out and physically checked an area (via GPS cordinates) that the cougar stayed in for 4-5 days which indicated a kill. I believe they tracked him approximately for one year.
It will be interesting to find out if predators are the main cause of deer numbers not being able to rebound once they get to a depressed number. It isn't that cougars are killing more deer than they used to, but maybe it is because they are preying on a deer population that has become so depressed it needs to have additional predator removal done until the deer population can increase and be able to bear the increase predation by cougars.
Back in the 50's and 60's when 1080 poison was being used there were some harsh winters that really knocked the deer numbers down, but then there would be a huge increase in deer numbers over the next few years. There is a good possibility that the increase was possible because the predator numbers were extremely low then. In the past 3 decades since the ban of 1080 we have not seen that big peaks and valleys in deer numbers. Just maybe it is because of predators-- coyotes included, that we don't get the recovery in deer numbers we used to.