Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/742011
S P O R T I N G C L A S S I C S • 113 points out that for many years the Federal government encouraged ranchers to plant crested wheatgrass, which supposedly provides better grazing for cattle (many ranchers would dispute that). The resulting monoculture proved devastating to mule deer, a species that has evolved to eat a very specific diet. because of man's influence on the native landscape, and his war on predators, the 1950s and 1960s represented artificially high numbers of mule deer, so that what we consider a decline now may be nothing more than a return to a more normal, pre-European state, a return to the numbers that existed when the Corps of Discovery crew members were relying on wild game to feed themselves. Add to that a dramatic change in the natural vegetation of the West. Miles Moretti of the Mule Deer Foundation domestic animals also changed the forage to shrubs and forbs that mule deer thrive on. Those factors allowed mule deer to increase to unprecedented levels. There is a reason why the 1950s and 1960s are considered the golden age of mule deer hunting. So why are mule deer declining now? The increase in predators—wolves, mountain lions, and coyotes—is part of it. But more importantly, add to that loss of habitat due to farming, urban sprawl, subdivisions, fences, and interstate highways that bisect winter ranges, migratory routes, and transitional areas. And let's not forget radical fire suppression in habitat that used to burn and then quickly sprout new green forage for deer. But to clarify, the primary reasons are that