# Monroe Mountain issues



## bigbr (Oct 24, 2007)

I left last Tuesday for my 2010 deer and scouting hunt. I put in a lot of leg work and over a thousand miles on the truck and the atv. Scouted the Fish Lake, Monroe, North Dutton, Parker, and Boulder and even spent an evening on Thousand Lake. I would say that this is by far the worst year I have ever in my life seen for deer total numbers on these units. Deer numbers in my opinion are at the lowest level they have ever been in my hunting career. Not only on Monroe but the rest of the units scouted. Thousand Lake is a joke with just six does spotted in an evening scout the night before the hunt.

We chose to spend the first day hunting on the Monroe as my hunting buddy has 15 elk points and has been applying for the Monroe for several seasons now. We arrived at first light on the Koosharem side and seen five deer on the rim with one spike. We did not harvest a buck this year due to the fact that we had made an agreement to only harvest a four points or better. The first day we seen about 10 other hunting parties on the mountain and our hunting / scouting covered from Big Lake to the Forshie and from Greenwich to Dry Creek. Not only did we not see many deer (total 9), but elk were nowhere to be found. Very few tracks and it was a perfect day for deer hunting with fresh light snow and almost no pressures. After a couple of pushes in my favorite spots and some miles on the ATV, we stopped on top for lunch.

A forest service truck pulled up and we spent almost an hour talking with Mr. Rasmussen a Fish Lake Biologist residing in Salina. Here is a summarized account of that conversation. In a joint effort with DWR and Forest service biologist, eighty different deer of all ages and sexes where fitted with radio transponder collars in the summer of 2009 on the Monroe Mountain. These collars transponder sent out vital statistics daily so that biologist could know almost instantly of mortality. Mr. Rasmussen reported that of the 80 deer collared only 17 remained alive as of the date we talked and that sixty % of the mortality was due to predation and of that the majority offenders were mountain lions. Coyotes were a close second with no reported human mortality, hunting or otherwise. Mr. Rasmussen reported that with all of the hunts occurring on the mountain that overwhelming pressure was being placed on the elk herd and the herd was leaving the mountain almost a month and half earlier than in years past to the winter range, which put un intended consequences on not only for the elk, but for the deer. The Elk Management objective for the Monroe is set at 1800 animals with the all-time high being approximately 1500 elk reached sometime in the early 2000’s and the current low of 800 animals in, (I believe he said 2008.) Currently the estimate is about 1000 elk on the Monroe.

The increase in pressure causing the elk to move to winter range early is a catastrophic problem for Monroe’s deer herd in the fact that the extra month .5 consumed forage on the shared winter range is causing deer to die of starvation as the deer are being driven out by the elk and forced to forage on much less and least productive nutritional forage and areas. The second big problem is that the elk are now showing up in agricultural areas once tolerated by farmers foraged by deer, but are now asking that the elk be destroyed to reduce crop damage. Most farmers have tolerated the deer, but will not tolerate the elk foraging on their crops as the damage is to serveir. Those few deer come out of winter distressed and in poor condition are producing lower numbers of fawns with high mortality rates due to predation. Even controlled burns and spring tooth harrowing projects have done little to firm up the decline in deer numbers on the Monroe. Mr, Rasmussen recommends that an aggressive predator control program be implemented immediately and that in order to try and stabilize the deer herds, he recommends a ten year closure to any deer hunting on the unit and reduced hunting pressure on the elk herd.

I would have to agree with the conclusions of Mr. Rasmussen and would say that this is not only a problem for the Monroe but most of the fish lake and probably the State of Utah. The State of Utah’s Deer herds are in serious trouble and to those few hunters arguing that Utah must have a continued general hunt! I say that 2010 may have been our last general hunt for Mule Deer in Utah as the mule deer may have suffered more than they can endure……Big


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## goofy elk (Dec 16, 2007)

Excellent report Big!
I know steps have already been taken on lions, and its opening to harvest objective..

And again, this is why I support option 2 on the deer proposal so these units can
be dealt with on a ,unit by unit, individual level....

I agree with this report 100% and feel the deer herd is in the worst shape of my
lifetime as well............Options 1 & 3 on the deer proposals will not do enough.


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## Iron Bear (Nov 19, 2008)

Thanks for the post. I guess I might not be totally crazy. 

Yikes I don't like the idea of closed hunting for 10yrs. But I do believe it would take nearly that long of a conservative LE program to get the deer on Monroe to the point of a 1000 buck per yr harvest. 

What winter range is Mr Rasmussen referring to? The bottom of the MTN?


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## ntrl_brn_rebel (Sep 7, 2007)

Interesting :shock: 

Thanks for the report, as sad as it is....


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## bigbr (Oct 24, 2007)

Iron Bear said:


> What winter range is Mr Rasmussen referring to? The bottom of the MTN?


 The only specific area mentioned was Greenwich area. I know that King's get a lot of elk on their place also and there are bound to be a lot more.

Big


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