# Whitail in UTAH



## katorade (Sep 23, 2007)

-*|*- Just saw a whiteail doe come out of the cornfield by my house didn't know is was whitetail till today when I got the binos. Pretty cool will get pictures when it comes out again.


----------



## Bergy (Apr 3, 2008)

Lots of folks on this forum arent going to be -*|*- excited that you have seen a whitetail in Utah. Most folks will be more upset. :evil: Where did you see the whitetail?


----------



## lehi (Sep 13, 2007)

Ah.... yet another whitetail in Utah thread. Yes, they have been sighted many times. Salty (former forum member, maybe he is under another name) had a picture of one shot in utah on his website a while ago. I believe it was shot near the bear river during muzzleloader season. Maybe he lurks on this forum he can give us more info.


----------



## bigbuck81 (Oct 10, 2007)

Kill them all! We dont need any of those darn whitetails in Utah! I wouldnt want to hunt a whitetail in Utah. Maybe in some other state but not here!!! Bummer that they keep showing up. _O\


----------



## jungle (May 10, 2008)

I do not know but the idea or question just hit me: 

What effect are the wolves having on whitetail movements? 

And are the wolves pushing the whitetails preferentially in the general direction of Utah and other new whitetail habitiat? 

Or is the timing of the appearance of whitetails in Utah, which happens to roughly coincide with the reintroduction of the wolf out west, coincidence? 

I mean, didn't we see a whitetail on the Utah side of Wyoming border on Outdoors with Doug Miller in the 1990s???


----------



## xxxxxxBirdDogger (Mar 7, 2008)

Yummy! Having lived in the South I know the value of a tasty mammal. I believe I recently saw 3 whitetails running on private ground along the Bear also. I was a long ways away, but those horns sure sat forward on the buck and I saw three white flags raised as they ran, not stotted, away from me.

And jungle, we've had whitetails along the rivers in Cache and Box Elder Counties for years now.


----------



## DallanC (Jan 13, 2009)

bigbuck81 said:


> Kill them all! We dont need any of those darn whitetails in Utah! I wouldnt want to hunt a whitetail in Utah. Maybe in some other state but not here!!! Bummer that they keep showing up. _O\


No! Bring'em on... the more tags filled with a whitetail buck is 1 less muley getting killed.

-DallanC


----------



## Nor-tah (Dec 16, 2007)

We have seen a few in last couple of years in Wasatch County. Bucks and does. :shock:


----------



## katorade (Sep 23, 2007)

Bergy said:


> Lots of folks on this forum arent going to be -*|*- excited that you have seen a whitetail in Utah. Most folks will be more upset. :evil: Where did you see the whitetail?


Box elder county


----------



## Huge29 (Sep 17, 2007)

katorade said:


> Bergy said:
> 
> 
> > Lots of folks on this forum arent going to be -*|*- excited that you have seen a whitetail in Utah. Most folks will be more upset. :evil: Where did you see the whitetail?
> ...


that seems to be the hot spot for the whiteys; maybe due to all of the whitetail habitat = hay fields, corn, etc.


----------



## Hunter Tom (Sep 23, 2007)

Deer are deer. I welcome ******'s to enhance hunting. I hunt the boulder for deer and the mule deer herd always seems to struggle. Does are not hunted in the high country(10,000' plus) herd yet this herd never grows like it should. Could be winter losses but most probably predation. Maybe ****** can fill in some gaps?


----------



## Mojo1 (Sep 8, 2007)

Want'em or not you're gonna get them, whitetails are by far the more adaptable of the 2 species. I love whitetails, I'd much rather chow on them than mulies.


----------



## nolaut (Jul 7, 2009)

As of this post I have 2 weeks left to tag out on a archery deer (not including the extended area). I have a handfull of encounters with some nice mules but yet to close the deal. I am hunting for the satisfaction of putting some tasty food on the table (can not eat the antlers and I'm comfortable with my manhood).

I have had whitetail which I like very much and I hear that a young mulie feeding on crops is close to a whitetail as table-fair goes.

Can any one here say the same about this comparison or what is your experience between the two.

I ask this based on the fact that I have a good chance of harvesting a whitetail if I concentrate on hunting the cashe valley or some other riverbottom in northern Utah.


----------



## Bergy (Apr 3, 2008)

I like hunting mule deer more then whitetails, but I like eating whitetails more then mule deer. I dont know if you can honestly compare the two. I think if a mule deer ate nothing but corn, soy bean and acorns and $%@! :twisted: flowers out of my garden they would taste very similar.


----------



## #1DEER 1-I (Sep 10, 2007)

DallanC said:


> bigbuck81 said:
> 
> 
> > Kill them all! We dont need any of those darn whitetails in Utah! I wouldnt want to hunt a whitetail in Utah. Maybe in some other state but not here!!! Bummer that they keep showing up. _O\
> ...


.....Or one less mule deer for every whitetail that moves into the state.


----------



## Bergy (Apr 3, 2008)

Im not so sure that whitetails will displace muleys. Seems like they fill a different niche, WY, MT, and CO all have huntable whitetail populations and those states have great populations on Muleys. You can curse the whitetail deer all you want but they are the most adaptable critters that I have ever seen. They also multiply like mad. Here in Virginia where I live Ive been doing a lot of scouting this year. Every doe I see has twin fawns in tow. They can live in places that you would never imagine a deer would be. I have a ton of respect for them and I love to hunt them. Still, I do understand muley fanatics concerns.... but come on.... :roll:


----------



## colpin (Nov 25, 2008)

2 years ago I seen a whitetail buck with a couple does walking down the fence line just off of
I-15 a few miles north of Brigham.


----------



## Petersen (Sep 7, 2007)

Rich, Cache, Weber, Morgan and Summit counties are right on the edge of white-tail territory, and it's been that way for years. They will occasionally wander into adjacent counties, but why they've never expanded much beyond that is anybody's guess. In time, it could happen, I suppose. If it does, I wonder how it would affect the mule deer population — displace some of them or occupy a niche not now filled by mulies?


----------



## xxxxxxBirdDogger (Mar 7, 2008)

I don't think they've expanded much because whitetails are valley deer. Our I-15 corridor, Willard, and the Great Salt Lake pretty much prevents them from moving south through Box Elder Co. Same thing in Logan with the rivers running right through town and the big freeway running the corridor down the canyon. I don't know much about the topography of those other counties you mentioned, Pete, but most whitetails aren't going to cross over the mountains. They travel the valleys. Our valleys are crowded so 1-1 = 0.


----------



## hunting777 (May 3, 2009)

so tell me this, i dont know much about white tailed deer. i personally have seen a lot up here in box elder county, and i don't want them here. but will breeding intermix with these two variety of deer. my brother shot a mulie a few years ago just west of tremonton and it sure was wierd it had the body of a mulie and the antlers of a white tail. so is this the type of deer we are going to be seeing now or what? also tell me this, i have heard that you don't need a tag to hunt these deer and could hunt them any time you want. i have never done it, i want to know if this is legal? to me it don't sound right.


----------



## lehi (Sep 13, 2007)

Killing a whitetail still requires the same tags as it does for mulies. Utah deer tags don't specify "Mule Deer" They specify "Buck Deer". So no, you can't kill them whenever you want.


----------



## xxxxxxBirdDogger (Mar 7, 2008)

hunting777, last question first: we don't buy mule deer tags. We buy deer tags. Anyone who takes a whitetail deer out of season is a poacher. Period and end of story. 

As to the interbreeding, it's pretty rare for the two species to breed but it happens on occasion. According to a Texas Parks & Wildlife study, DNA evidence shows interbreeding at about 8% in areas of high concentration of both species. There are so many states with both whities and mule deer now that the evidence overwhelmingly shows the two can coexist. Whitetail deer do not threaten mule deer. Cattle are much, much more competitive for browse than whitetail will ever be. Cattle and deer ranges are pretty much one and the same in Utah. 

I do know plenty of farmers who don't like whitetails. That's another story. Whitetail eat crops and live in the fertile valleys inhabited by farmers. To me that is where the negativity comes in and how all the false rumors get started.


----------



## muleydeermaniac (Jan 17, 2008)

Just my tidbit. I live the the south ogden area, there are two whitetail doe that live in the fields by my home, and they are almost always with the mulies that live there.


----------



## Artoxx (Nov 12, 2008)

About seven years ago or thereabouts I was hunting down south of Spanish Fork. I was trailling a set of BIG deer tracks that were still crumbling around the edges, so I knew they were FRESH!

I followed them into a humongous clump of scrub oak, and at times it was so thick that I had my rifle slung over my back and my .44 in my hands as I belly crawled through the tunnels left by the deer. I kept hearing movement ahead of me, but never close enough to actually see the deer, but still within 20-30 yards or closer.
At one point I got to an opening that was about 20 feet in diameter, and right in the middle, right next to the trail, was a 3-4 foot scrape, reeking of urine and with a licking branch hanging right in the middle of it about 4 feet off the ground.
I have seen a couple of whitetail scrapes before and this was identical, right down to the smell.
Muleys make scrapes that are closer to 8-10 feet in diameter and don't necessarily have anything resembling a licking branch, though there may be one or more beaten up trees. 
I am POSITIVE that this was a whitetail scrape, and that deer was HUGE, in foot size if not rack.
I played this game with him for close to 2 hours, and suddenly heard him go CRASH, CRASH, CRASH, off to one side of where he had been, and then I could hear him rustling branches back down the hillside towards where we had started out in the first place. I know he was within 30 feet, but never caught so much as a glimpse of him.
I worked myself forward another 50 feet or so, and broke out the side of the clump onto bare dirt stretching away up the hill. I looked and I could see his fresh tracks going up the side of the clump and re-entering on another trail about 10 yards or so away from the one he came out on.
I gave up and gave him the trophy at that point, Rotten **** deer knew perfectly well that I was there, and how far away, and just how close he could get without me seeing him. As soon as his cover ran out, he moved fast and got back into it at a different point.
I have never had a mule deer act quite that cagey, and am convinced that it was a whitetail buck that I was playing tag with. 
I might be wrong, BUT I AM CONVINCED! :mrgreen:

And if I am RIGHT, then there are whitetails further into this state than Logan or Box Elder county. Personally, since I go hunting for deer nearly every year, and yet only manage to find a legal buck about once every 5-7 years, I would just as soon that some whitetails moved in where I might be able to find THEM, if I can't find a muley. At this point I am not that picky.
Not hunting big game of any variety THIS year, due to the unemployment and not knowing if I was even going to BE in this state, come October, never mind having a home to bring a deer TO if I had drawn a tag and managed to find one, but that is THIS year.
And now that I am employed, I can have at least a little more confidence that I will be hunting SOMETHING this year.
I spend a lot more time and effort of birds anyway, so I will survive not having a deer tag burning a hole in my pocket.


----------



## jungle (May 10, 2008)

There are a few myths floating around:


1. I have helped motorists hit by big whitetail bucks crossing freeways in other states. I -15 will not stop them. 
2. Check the mountainous regions of Montana and you will find big country whitetail. No, not just river bottom vally animals. Most whitetails WILL cross the mountains.
3. I harvest whitetails in an area near a road that separates mule deer herds on the north side of the road and the whitetails on the south side. Interbreeding happens but its rare according to biologists. They could co-exist with Mulies quite well.
4. I believe, though I cant prove, that the whitetails will take some hunting pressure off of the mule deer. 
5. Increased revenue for farmers.

There is absolutely no scientific basis for the fear that whitetails will hurt our mule deer population.


----------



## muley_crazy (Sep 7, 2007)

So what part of Box Elder County? Do you have pics yet?


----------



## xxxxxxBirdDogger (Mar 7, 2008)

> 1. I have helped motorists hit by big whitetail bucks crossing freeways in other states. I -15 will not stop them.


Some will slip through the orchards and along the lake shores, of course, but it's not a deer-friendly corridor to travel. That's my point. 


> 2. Check the mountainous regions of Montana and you will find big country whitetail. No, not just river bottom vally animals. Most whitetails WILL cross the mountains.


I've hunted whitetails as well and have lived in Texas. Whitetails use the valleys or ravines or gulches or whatever structure they can use to avoid going over the top to pass from mountain to mountain. Hunt mountain whitetails for any stretch of time and you'll quickly learn to stay 1/3-1/2 or more of the way off the tops of the hills. There's a reason they clear big senderos in Texas for the whitetails to travel. The landowners have learned how to put their hunters on bucks. Obviously some animals will find their way across the mountain. Most whitetails will stay off the top of a mountain. That's a fact. Montana whitetails have a lot of country to use to make their move from mountain to mountain. The top of our state is not nearly so conducive to migration. The question is if enough animals can make it through to central Utah to start new herds. I don't know.


----------



## longbow (Mar 31, 2009)

> by muley_crazy on Aug 30, '09, 12:05
> 
> So what part of Box Elder County? Do you have pics yet


I have pictures. There are whitetails in my neighborhood. This is one of the crosses that walked down the tracks behind my yard.


----------



## muley_crazy (Sep 7, 2007)

longbow said:


> > by muley_crazy on Aug 30, '09, 12:05
> >
> > So what part of Box Elder County? Do you have pics yet
> 
> ...


Cool, thanks for sharing.


----------



## jungle (May 10, 2008)

longbow said:


> > by muley_crazy on Aug 30, '09, 12:05
> >
> > So what part of Box Elder County? Do you have pics yet
> 
> ...


Uh, I think those are mulies....note the white rump. Thats a mulie.

The tail of a whitetail, when hanging down, is the same brown color of the whole deer. The only white part of the tail of the whitetail is the underside of the tail.

Those are mulies.


----------



## Texscala (Sep 8, 2007)

He (Jungle) is right....you can even google it.


----------



## Texscala (Sep 8, 2007)

Or just go here

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl= ... N%26um%3D1


----------



## Nor-tah (Dec 16, 2007)

Not the best pics but I have seen these deer in person. Deadicated1 took the pics. These are the ones we have seen in Wasatch. I have jumped out of the car and spooked them to make sure, sure enough.. flash flash flash. These pics are about 3 years old. I saw a doe there last november.


----------



## Huge29 (Sep 17, 2007)

The 3rd pic certainly is indisputable.


----------



## Renegade (Sep 11, 2007)

Whitetail Buck:









Mule Deer Buck:


----------



## fixed blade XC-3 (Sep 11, 2007)

I'm pretty sure longbow was messing with us.


----------



## longbow (Mar 31, 2009)

Nope, not messin' with ya. Look at the deer on the right. Clearly a hybrid. The tail is very typical of a coastal blacktail. The one on the left has all the markings of a muledeer. I have seen two other deer behind my house that look like whitetails, one 4-point and one doe but I haven't got a picture yet. Sorry I should have explained the picture better in the first place.


----------



## Riverrat77 (Sep 7, 2007)

longbow said:


> Nope, not messin' with ya. Look at the deer on the right. Clearly a hybrid. The tail is very typical of a coastal blacktail. The one on the left has all the markings of a muledeer. I have seen two other deer behind my house that look like whitetails, one 4-point and one doe but I haven't got a picture yet. Sorry I should have explained the picture better in the first place.


I just read this for the first time and noticed the tail on the one on our right as well... clearly not your typical mulie tail, narrow and white with a black tip. Definitely "flaggy". Nice pictures... pretty cool pics you had too Kyle. That one doesn't look like a bad buck at all, if you could ever catch him on public ground, he'd be a heck of a trophy.


----------



## jungle (May 10, 2008)

longbow said:


> Nope, not messin' with ya. Look at the deer on the right. Clearly a hybrid. The tail is very typical of a coastal blacktail. The one on the left has all the markings of a muledeer. I have seen two other deer behind my house that look like whitetails, one 4-point and one doe but I haven't got a picture yet. Sorry I should have explained the picture better in the first place.


Yeah, that one on the right (in the first picture on this thread) definitely has a funky looking butt! But, yeah, it looks more blacktail-ish or hybrid-ish.

Love to get a sample of that bucks DNA-


----------



## longbow (Mar 31, 2009)

Well if he comes a beboppin' through my yard again, I'm going to fling some Port Orford cedar at him. Then I can get some real closeups of him. That goes for the whitetails too.


----------



## Guest (Sep 1, 2009)

My family has 300 acres in Box Elder county along the Bear River and I have seen whitetail does there on a couple of occasions in the river bottoms.

Personally I don't understand all the fear and controversy over a potential "whitetail invasion" of Utah. Whitetails and mulies have coexisted in North America for thousands of years, long before Europeans came along and started trying to "manage" wildlife. There are several western states where their ranges currently overlap and neither species is adversely affected by the other. They tend to exploit different resources (I use the words "tend to" because, of course, you can always find exceptions), and inter-breeding, while it does occur, does not happen often enough to impact the fertility rate or pollute the gene pool of the population as a whole. In fact, most whitetail-mulie hybrids are either sterile or do not survive to breeding age due to the fact that they do not properly inherit the survival strategies of either species and are easier prey for predators and hunters. For example, hybrid deer are very poor runners due to the very different way each species runs to escape predators. It is estimated that less than 50% of whitetail-mulie hybrid fawns survive their first few months. This would be a serious threat to deer populations if inter-breeding was common, but it isn't, and it is actually a benefit to have the few hybrids that do occur weeded out of the gene pool. Besides, whitetail deer have had thousands of years to colonize Utah territories, again, long before we came on the scene, but have not done so for natural reasons. The bottom line is that mule deer are better suited to the high and dry terrain, and are better adapted to exploit the resources that it offers. In fact, historically bighorn sheep were more common in Utah than mule deer were, until European settlers introduced domesticated sheep grazing which nearly wiped out the native sheep by communicable diseases to which the native bighorn sheep had no immunities, similar to the way native American Indians were decimated by disease. 

So I just don't think we need to get ourselves all worked up about whitetail deer. If they could thrive in Utah they would already be here by now, whether we wanted them or not, and then they would just offer Utah deer hunters more diversity and opportunity for hunting, whether you preferred whitetail or mulies, or could care less as long as it had antlers.


----------



## Huntoholic (Sep 17, 2008)

Blacktail
[attachment=0:3m4t9610]P1000996 reduced.JPG[/attachment:3m4t9610]


----------



## DallanC (Jan 13, 2009)

How about some fun facts.

http://www.blacktailcountry.com/html/blkpage.htm


> For many years the Columbian Blacktail Deer has been considered a subspecies of the Mule deer, however recent DNA testing has proven this not to be the case. In Valerius Geist's informative book Mule Deer Country he explains that by testing the mitochondrial DNA (the mothers DNA ) of the three species (blacktail, whitetail and mule deer), researchers have now determined that it was the mating of Whitetail does and Blacktail buck's that gave rise to the Mule deer and not the opposite as was once suspected.
> 
> It is now believed that millions of years ago the Whitetail deer expanded its range down the east coast of the United States, across Mexico, and then back up the West coast, where it eventually evolved into the Blacktail Deer. This may help to explain the strong resemblance in appearance and psychological characteristics between the two. Thousands of years later as the recently evolved Blacktail's range spread eastward and the Whitehall's range again expanded westward, the two deer again met. At this point the Blacktail bucks, displaced the Whitetail bucks, and bred the Whitetail does. Researches now believe that it is this hybridization that produced what is now know as the Muledeer.


http://www.createstrat.com/muledeerinthewest/name.html


> When two species breed, the offspring is called a hybrid. Different species of animals normally do not breed with one another because they use different habitats, or are geographically isolated. If similar species live in the same habitat, then they generally breed at different times or have different breeding behavior.
> 
> In the case of white-tailed deer and mule deer, courtship and breeding behavior are different enough that body language and scent cues from a female mule deer during rut are not normally "understood" by a white-tailed deer buck, and vice versa. In some cases where ranges overlap, this system breaks down and mule deer and white-tailed deer may mate and produce a hybrid deer.
> 
> ...


-DallanC


----------



## GaryFish (Sep 7, 2007)

> Every year numerous hunters report seeing hybrid deer, however, it is unlikely a hunter will ever see a hybrid deer in the field. The low number of white-tailed deer that mate with mule deer, and the low survival rate of hybrid offspring, greatly reduces the chance of encountering a true hybrid in the wild. Hybrids are rare and difficult to accurately identify because of many varying characteristics.


See, the funny thing to me is that all theories of evolution require such hybridizations to take place. Which is one flaw in the evolution theories. Sure, traits wtihin species change through selective survival and breeding - but the creation of a new species through hybridization, or mutants (for lack of a better term) within a species breeding to create a completely new and viable species? I have problems accepting that as THE answer in the evolution of man, or any other species for that matter. If hybridization results in sterile and non-viable offspring, then the theory that mule deer are the result from whitetail/blacktail hybridization is flawed.


----------



## DallanC (Jan 13, 2009)

GaryFish said:


> I have problems accepting that as THE answer in the evolution of man, or any other species for that matter. If hybridization results in sterile and non-viable offspring, then the theory that mule deer are the result from whitetail/blacktail hybridization is flawed.


Who says all hybridization results in sterile offspring?

You would rather have the answer "God created Whitetails, Mule Deer etc etc individually"...? If that is your logic then interbreeding between whitetails and mule deer is even more irrelevant because its either Gods intent to create a new hybrid strain and nothing we do will prevent it, or its not Gods intent and he wont allow it to become a predominant species.

-DallanC


----------



## GaryFish (Sep 7, 2007)

It is a question I certainly don't have the answer to. But it is the 900 pound hybrid gorilla in the room of trans-species evolution. For a new species to be created, we are talking about a pertty serious genetic mutation here. Genetic mutations that significant are seldom viable in the wild, and if viable, would have to hook up with another such genetic mutant and then have off-spring. I'm not talking about variations within species, like color changes, size, or certain physical characteristics (like in the many breeds of dog - all are still dogs - just with selective variations but not new species). And the whitetail/mule deer discussion adds to this. If the two species cross breed, is the offspring viable? Is it sterile? In deed, are the two deer even different species, or just the same species with different attributes? Its a tough question, and one that right now, according to biologists, has many different answers. But the overall concept is at the core of trans-species evolution. And it leaves a hole in the faith of trans-species evolution I'm yet to see bridged.


----------



## DallanC (Jan 13, 2009)

GaryFish said:


> Its a tough question, and one that right now, according to biologists, has many different answers. But the overall concept is at the core of trans-species evolution. And it leaves a hole in the faith of trans-species evolution I'm yet to see bridged.


That is certainly a good point, and one I actually agree with.

-DallanC


----------



## Raptorman (Aug 18, 2009)

The only issue I have with the Whitetails, is that I lived in Northern Alberta for a couple years and in one place I lived, way out in BFE I saw a ton of whitetails. From talking to the locals, they said that Mule deer used to be the only deer, but then the whitetails moved in and after that it is harder to find muleys and tons of whitetails. Now, I don't have numbers just what I was told up there so take it for what it's worth.


----------



## hunter_orange13 (Oct 11, 2008)

bump 


i work on a farm in elwood and my boss said another farmer saw one the other day. 

i would like whitetails. it can solve our problems of not enough tags to go around. i think we should be trading something for whitetails. in nebraska and other states with lots of whitetails youcan shoot them all day legally. i like that. enough venison for a year supply!


----------



## muley_crazy (Sep 7, 2007)

hunter_orange13 said:


> bump
> 
> i work on a farm in elwood and my boss said another farmer saw one the other day.
> 
> i would like whitetails. it can solve our problems of not enough tags to go around. i think we should be trading something for whitetails. in nebraska and other states with lots of whitetails youcan shoot them all day legally. i like that. enough venison for a year supply!


Who do you work for in Elwood? Is it John Farms?


----------



## hunter_orange13 (Oct 11, 2008)

nope i work for a barfuss


----------



## flyfisher117 (Jun 29, 2009)

nobody is giving the white tail the respect it needs...now yes they dont get giant sets of horns on them and they dont get as big as muleys but they do taste good

montana white tail tastiest deer ive ever eaten


----------



## TCSSPRO204 (Sep 27, 2008)

I have also seen a couple whitetail bucks between Riverside and Tremonton both have been at night or early in the am but for sure whitetail! I have also seen a doe just west of the hunter education building just west of logan. I think the Malad river bottoms and the Bear hold quite a few??


----------



## katorade (Sep 23, 2007)

Ya this one goes down to the bear river I'm guessing the corn is getting cut now.


----------

