Sitka Black-tailed Deer Management and Research

Publications & Reports

• Sitka Black-tailed Deer Management and Harvest Reports
• Sitka Black-tailed Deer Research Grant Reports and Publications

Management

Evaluation of deer populations for management is based on a variety of indicators, including pellet-group surveys, hunter contacts, field observations, harvest questionnaires, and mortality transects.

Research

As of 2012, a research project on Sitka Black-tailed deer is underway on northeast Chichagof Island, and deer have been equipped with GPS collars.

Research Projects

• Movement patterns, home range, and habitat use by Sitka black-tailed deer in Southeast Alaska
• Survivorship of Sitka black-tailed deer fawns in Southeast Alaska

Project Information

Survivorship of Sitka black-tailed deer fawns in Southeast Alaska

Project 2.14, Federal Aid in Wildlife Restoration Grant. Project Duration: July 1, 2008–June 30, 2014. Principal Investigator: Dave Person, Ketchikan.

We propose to study survivorship and habitat selection of neonate and fawn Sitka black-tailed deer on Prince of Wales Island in Southeast Alaska.

Sources and rates of fawn mortality and the influence of those sources on deer population dynamics likely are strongly linked to habitat quality or composition, and the proximity of the deer population to carrying capacity (K). Adult deer can store fat during summer and fall that may enable them to survive winters on relatively poor winter range. Fawns do not accumulate fat reserves as readily and are, therefore, likely to be more sensitive indicators of habitat quality and composition than adults. In a study of deer survivorship on Heceta Island in Southeast Alaska, shrub/sapling and seral stage second-growth habitat significantly increased the risk of malnutrition for fawns. Both habitats result largely from clearcut logging and/or large windstorm events, and provide poor habitat for deer. Shrub/sapling habitat consists of coniferous regeneration 3-6 meters high about 20-40 years after logging. Understory vegetation consists mostly of older shrubs that persist in patches where gaps in the forest canopy occur. Interception of snow is poor making forage unavailable to deer in winters with snow. Seral forest occurs 35-40 years post logging and is characterized by a closed coniferous canopy and depauperate understory vegetation. Those conditions persist for the rest of the harvest rotation. That habitat is poor for deer throughout the year because forage is scarce. However, shrub/sapling and younger seral forest stands that were pre-commercially thinned at 10-20 years post logging may have levels of forage biomass comparable to young clearcuts and unmanaged old growth forest. Those stands may provide abundant summer forage for deer under some conditions and enhance recruitment temporarily.

In addition to increasing risks of malnutrition, even-aged forest management may indirectly increase risk from predation. Young seral coniferous stands on the Kenai Peninsula of Alaska had significantly higher densities of black bears than older coniferous stands. Litter sizes of black bears were larger and age at first reproduction younger for sows in the younger seral forest. They also noted that predation by bears on moose calves was 4 times greater in younger forest habitat than in older forest. It follows that young regenerating coniferous stands in Southeast Alaska may promote high densities of black bears and increase risks of predation for fawns.

Neonate fawns that are nutritionally stressed and likely to die of disease or starvation may be more vulnerable to predation. Some fawns killed by predators likely would not survive their first winter regardless of predation, and thus would not be recruited into the deer population. Mortality from all sources may be largely compensatory as an ungulate population exceeds maximum sustained yield and approaches K. Nonetheless, compensatory mortality may be significant even in ungulate populations well below K.