Habitat and herbivore density: response of mule deer to habitat management
Number of files: 1
Item Metadata
Dublin Core
Title
Habitat and herbivore density: response of mule deer to habitat management
Description
The suite of demands competing for wildlife management funds necessitates direct assessment of management decisions, especially when these decisions have direct costs, as well as tangible opportunity costs. We conducted a mark–resight study that estimated mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) density across multiple study units in southwest Colorado that had been exposed to different intensities of habitat treatments. Our treatments were comprised of common habitat management techniques including hydro-axe and roller-chopper disturbances as well chemical control of weeds and reseeding with desirable mule deer browse species. Reference study units received no habitat management treatments. Total deer densities varied between 20–84 deer/km2 in southern study units and 4–12 deer/km2 in northern study units. We did not observe a consistent pattern of higher deer density on advanced treatment study units despite it being the primary hypothesis of the study. We observed a wide range of variation in deer density among years. Resighting probabilities (range 0.070–0.567) were best modeled as an interactive function of study unit and year, although sampling method was also influential. We recommend that if population density is to be used as a population response variable, it be used in tandem with other, possibly more sensitive parameters such as overwinter survival or late winter body condition.
Bibliographic Citation
Bergman, E. J., P. F. Doherty, G. C. White, and D. J. Freddy. 2014. Habitat and herbivore density: response of mule deer to habitat management. The Journal of Wildlife Management 79:60-68. https://doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.801
Creator
Bergman, Eric J.
Doherty Jr, Paul F.
White, Gary C.
Freddy, David J.
Subject
Abundance
Colorado
Environmental change
Habitat management
Mark–resight
Mule deer
Odocoileus hemionus
Resighting probabilities
Extent
9 pages
Date Created
2014-11-12
Type
Article
Format
application/pdf
Language
English
Is Part Of
The Journal of Wildlife Management
Collection
Citation
Bergman, Eric J. et al., “Habitat and herbivore density: response of mule deer to habitat management,” CPW Digital Collections, accessed March 11, 2025, https://cpw.cvlcollections.org/items/show/227.