Will Northern Wisconsin see new deer management units next year?

According to Oneida County Deer Advisory Council (CDAC) chairman Ed Choinski, the Oneida CDAC has been asking for a change in deer management unit boundaries. When the CDACs were established, the old system of deer management units (DMUs) went by the wayside and deer herds were instead managed along county boundaries. There has been a push by several northern counties, Oneida and Vilas included, to split management of the deer herd by habitat type rather than along those human-made boundaries. 

In Oneida County, the wish was to split the county east to west, with the region generally west of Highway 51, where hunters have reported deer herds have been decimated, being managed separately from the rest of the county.

In Vilas County, the wish was to split the county north to south. More often than not, the Winter Severity Index (WSI) in the northern half of the county is much higher than in the southern half. The WSI is simply a measure of snowfall and cold over the course of the winter. Each day, there is more than 18 inches of snow it that gets one point. Each day with highs below zero it also gets a point. Days where both of these conditions exist it receives two points. All of these points are tallied up at the end of the winter, with more points indicating a more severe winter. Both snowpack over 18 inches and below zero degree days create more difficult conditions for deer. This can make it more difficult for them to get through the winter, can lead to increased predation, and the deer that do make it through the winter are not as healthy. This could lead to mortality later, the birth of fewer fawns and/or fewer fawns surviving their first year.

At the August Natural Resources Board (NRB) meeting, Scott Karel, the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) wildlife policy specialist, brought forth a request for approval of a public hearing notice regarding looking at changing those DMUs, at least in the north, back to habitat-based units, as many have asked for in the last few years. 

The impetus behind managing the deer herd by habitat type, proponents said, was to treat different segments of the population differently when it came to things such as setting an antlerless quota. In areas where habitat was not as good, or where predator numbers had skyrocketed over the years, for instance, the area could be set with a zero quota, if warranted, while hunters in the remaining parts of a county, where perhaps conditions were move favorable and deer numbers were higher, could still have the opportunity to harvest an antlerless deer.

Shrinking deer numbers have been a source of concern for many years and this last winter, this was also the topic of a listening session held by Representative Rob Swearingen (R-Rhinelander), Mary Felzkowski (R-Tomahawk), with several other legislators in attendance, as well as NRB chair Bill Smith. Legislators and others listened as hunter after hunter spoke about not only the dwindling numbers of deer, but also the dwindling numbers of hunters coming to the area. 

Gregg Walker, Lakeland Times publisher, CDAC member and life-long hunter said the deer herd in Oneida County was in crisis. He said he felt it might not even be prudent to have a hunt in the county at all with the decline in the number of deer hunters were seeing in the woods. Walker has also been a staunch proponent of returning the DMUs to habitat-type-based units. It looks as though he, and others, may get to see that come true at long last.

Karel asked the NRB to approve the department to move ahead with the scope statement, which would allow them to begin drafting the rule. If it was deemed necessary, after review, the matter would then come back to the board for possible adoption and board action on an emergency rule as well as a permanent rule. The emergency rule, should it get to that point, would allow for the new DMUs to be utilized for quota setting in the 2025 deer season.

Shortly after the NRB meeting, DNR deer program specialist Jeff Pritzl sent a letter to CDACs of Northern Forest Zone Counties apprising them of the fact the department would be looking into the matter. He noted that CDACs do not have a formal role in this discussion and, as such, will not be meeting to call a vote on the matter. However, the letter did call CDACs an “important stakeholder and representative” of the communities they serve. With that in mind, the department wanted to afford the CDACs an early opportunity to engage in the discussion and provide their recommendations.

DMU boundaries have changed over time. As far back as the 1920s, county boundaries served as DMUs. That changed in the 1950s, when habitat-based DMUs were created. By 1965, the state had 77 DMUs, moving to over 120 by 2012. 

Deer and deer hunting has always been an important part of Wisconsin’s history and heritage. For that reason, it can create some heated debates as far as how the species is managed. In 2006, those concerns lead to an external audit. 

That audit stated the DMUs were too small to conduct population modeling. The primary recommendation, Pritzl told the NRB in August, was to go back to fewer, larger DMUs. This recommendation brought management units back to the 20s, 30s, and 40s, creating management units out of the man-made county boundaries. This also facilitated the CDAC program, however, which most have seen as an important step to gathering local and boots-on-the-ground information about the deer herd in each county. While a return to the habitat-based management of DMUs would change things a bit, it would still allow for the CDACs to have a strong voice in making those local decisions perhaps through a hybrid system, Pritzl had said.

Beckie Gaskill may be reached via email at [email protected].