Officials say population stability, fawn production are positive signs for area herd
By Heather Ruenz
Staff Writer
Area residents will join hundreds of thousands of other hunters throughout the state in pursuit of white-tailed deer as Wisconsin’s annual nine-day gun season opens Saturday.
State wildlife officials are offering an opportunistic forecast for the season running through Dec. 1, but those hopes – as always – will be dashed or confirmed by the results of the actual hunt.
In the five-county area of Jefferson, Kenosha, Racine, Walworth and Waukesha, there has been anecdotal evidence that prospects for the season are good.
Aerial surveys taken earlier this year indicate a stable to slowly increasing deer population in the southern district, according to Don Bates, of the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources.
“The southern Wisconsin herd came through last winter in very good shape despite the late spring,” Bates said. “Fawn production was excellent throughout the farmland region.”
While Kenosha, Racine and Walworth counties have had a relatively stable deer population over the past five years, Jefferson and Waukesha counties have seen a slight increase.
Bates said hunters in the southern district who take the time to scout their hunting areas and set up along active trails increase their chances to see deer and put venison in the freezer.
“Remember, you are in the deer’s living room where it is difficult to go unnoticed. Once the season starts, avoid letting the deer pattern you. Use different routes to get to and from your stand, don’t hunt the same time of day every time out and consider using varied stand locations depending on wind direction,” Bates said.
Hunters should have ample opportunity to bag the deer of their choice under the relaxed regulations for bagging deer in the Chronic Wasting Disease Management Zone, which includes the western half of Kenosha and Racine, the southern half of Waukesha, and all of Jefferson and Walworth counties.
The DNR remains committed to working with hunters and landowners to slow and contain the spread of CWD. Within the CWD zones, all hunters may harvest one buck per unused Gun Buck Deer Carcass Tag. Additional bucks may be harvested under the Bonus Buck structure. Under that rule, each deer tag allows the holder to bag one buck and unlimited antlerless deer, with the right to kill one additional buck with each antlerless deer taken.
The increased opportunities are intended to trim the size of the deer herd to slow the spread of the fatal disease in the management zone, which includes the southern third of the state.
CWD deer carcass tags are free and are offered at a rate of four tags per hunter per day.
More traditional carcass tag rules are in effect in the middle and northern parts of the state.
Statewide forecast
Kevin Wallenfang, big game ecologist for the DNR, said many factors were in the hunter’s favor last year, including the earliest possible gun opener on the calendar, good rut activity during the gun season and the fact that 90 percent, if not more, of the agricultural crops were picked by mid-November. Some of those factors may contribute to another successful hunt this year.
“Good hunting conditions throughout the fall resulted in the third consecutive year of increased deer harvest,” Wallenfang said. While Wisconsin is typically in the top three, it ranked first among states and the Canadian provinces in 2012 for producing trophy bucks by the Boone and Crocket Club.
The season structure for the 2013 deer season is almost identical to last year with only a few changes in individual deer management units – designated as “herd control” or “regular” units.
“In these areas, deer are generally abundant in relation to their local habitat and are controlled through the harvest of antlerless deer,” Wallenfang said.
Seasoned hunters know abundance can vary greatly across a unit due to several contributing factors including weather.
“Last winter arrived late and stayed long into spring. Deer, along with migrating birds, found ice and snow-covered ground instead of succulent shoots of new growth,” Wallenfang said, however, no drastic losses of deer were reported, therefore the prospects for increased deer abundance look promising in most areas.
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