Quality deer management coming to Michigan, aiming to improve the herd

[Bob S]

ARTICLE

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Dave Spratt / Special to The Detroit News

If you're a Michigan deer hunter, you've most likely heard of Quality Deer Management (QDM) or the Quality Deer Management Association (QDMA).

If you haven't, you might want to crawl out from under your rock and get caught up. Because QDM, a sometimes misunderstood practice for shaping deer herds, is about to enter Michigan's official lexicon.

Michigan will soon sign a memorandum of understanding with the QDMA. It's not much more than an agreement to agree. But it's an official recognition that our herd is way out of whack, that past deer-management practices need changing, that Michigan game officials want a healthier, smaller and better-balanced deer herd, and that the state is willing to work with QDMA to achieve those things.

"It focuses on the things that we share in common," said John Niewoonder, Michigan's acting Big Game Specialist. "Things like using sound science to manage the appropriate harvest of antlerless deer. It certainly doesn't go down the road of antler-point restrictions or any of that stuff that (QDMA) sometimes are associated with."

To understand what QDM is, it's important to understand what it is not. It is not Monster Buck Management, even though the end result is that bigger bucks walk the landscape. In its simplest form, QDM means shooting plenty of does and not shooting yearling bucks -- so they live to grow older. When properly applied, QDM results in a smaller deer population that has plenty to eat and behaves more naturally. It does have the fawns. Dominant bucks sire them. They're born at the right time of year.

The guy in the deer blind may see fewer deer overall, but he's also a lot more likely to see the wall-hanger buck of his dreams.

Russ Mason, the chief of the Michigan Department of Natural Resources Wildlife Division, is in Ontonagon today to explain to the Natural Resources Commission -- which sets game policies -- why QDM is right for Michigan.

"Whether it's habitat management, balancing herds with the available habitat, reducing the number of does in a herd to synchronize the rut and promoting other things that are favorable," Mason said. "Yeah, we believe in all those things."

Mason, who has been Michigan's wildlife chief for a little over a year, said he sees the QDMA's role as educating Michigan hunters on the value of QDM so they ultimately join the fold by choice. In other words, don't expect mandatory QDM-based rules any time soon. Mason said states that tried to force-feed QDM to hunters have had little success.

"We could go down the QDM path, and it's entirely possible that we will," he said. "I would prefer it be hunters choosing this path if they want to. Our strongest suit is when we're not regulators. And I'm not sure mandating things is where people want to go."

Quality Deer Management has steadily gained traction among Michigan hunters and landowners over the past few years. The QDMA has a state chapter with 17 different branches across Michigan and hundreds of small QDM co-ops where neighbors pool their land together, set mutually agreeable rules and follow them.

"That definitely is occurring in many places throughout the state, where deer management co-ops are forming," Niewoonder said. "There are many of them. Some are small and some are quite large. It's a grassroots deal where neighbors are talking to neighbors. It definitely is a growing thing at a grass-roots level."

Michigan already has taken some steps toward QDM practices, including allowing more than 20 deer-management units to try various antler-point restrictions on an experimental basis earlier this decade. Leaders of the Leelanau County QDM unit, one of five remaining, are so pleased with the result they want to expand into Benzie and Grand Traverse counties. A moratorium on adding QDM units ended in April 2008, and Mason said some members of the NRC seem amenable to expanding QDM areas.

That's not all. Last year, Michigan started an early antlerless season that began in September 2008 and continued this year, and the antler-restriction option that started for Upper Peninsula deer hunters last year. In the U.P., hunters can choose a single tag for any buck, or two tags for bucks with more antler points. That allows QDM supporters and opponents a chance to hunt deer the way they please.

"It's pretty neat how they have that where you have a one-buck tag or a two-buck tag," said Kip Adams, the QDMA's director of education and outreach for the northern United States. "I think that's a pretty unique way to please both ends of the hunters and to protect the young deer and have a better deer herd."

According to QDMA, Michigan hunters typically rank right at the top of all 50 states for the number of yearling bucks killed. In 2005, the last year for which there are national statistics, Michigan hunters killed the second-highest number of bucks, 63 percent of which were yearlings.

That's the exact practice QDM principles oppose. And more recently, Michigan hunters seem to be hearing the message. Last year, Michigan's antlerless harvest went up 12 percent, at the same time its buck harvest went down 7 percent.

But there's still one very important reality facing Michigan's game managers. The shoot-a-buck, pass-on-a-doe mentality that grew Michigan's deer herd for so many years is deeply ingrained in many Michigan hunters. Mason knows that isn't going away soon, but he figures you might as well start somewhere.

"To use too broad a sociological brush, we spent 120 years telling people they shouldn't shoot does," he said. "Now we tell people, 'Wait a minute. If you see a doe, shoot it, and if it has a fawn, shoot that too.' It's going to be a gradual thing, an erosion of the former truth for the present truth. But I'm pleased to see the doe harvest is going up, if for no other reason than they taste better."

Dave Spratt is a freelance writer and editor of http://www.greatnorthernoutdoors.net. You can reach him at dspratt@greatnorthernoutdoors.net.

[venado]

an erosion of the former truth for the present truth

Thanks for the post and congratulations for the interest that Michigan is showing in supporting basic QDM policies.

[GF.]

That's one of the smartest approaches to getting the principles in place that I've ever seen or heard.

The idea of 1 tag - any buck vs. 2 tags for bucks with point minimums is really interesting, but I'd still rather see 1 buck with a minimum and earn your second.... But point minimums aren't really that useful, when you get right down to it.

I still don't see where some folks miss the logic behind holding out for 2.5 yrs and up. Let a 1.5 go and shoot him next year or so down the road....

Maybe if we could just get some peer pressure rolling against shooting 1.5s....basically make guys feel like they have something to apologize for when they shoot one, same as we used to feel about 'doe-shooters'....as if shooting a 1.5 is basically an admission that you're just not much of a hunter and you had to take one of the easy ones....

And somebody who fills multiple tags on 1.5s? No-talent game-hogging....

[Laturkeyhtr]

Hey Bob, that seems like it is defnitely a step in the right direction. Education is always a plus when it comes to dealing with hunters. Many of them soon learn that their hunting is only going to improve.

Do keep us posted as things progress.

[Sabre]

Maybe if we could just get some peer pressure rolling against shooting 1.5s....basically make guys feel like they have something to apologize for when they shoot one, same as we used to feel about 'doe-shooters'....as if shooting a 1.5 is basically an admission that you're just not much of a hunter and you had to take one of the easy ones

You'll never make me feel guilty about killng year and a half bucks. I'm hunting for meat and the fun of the hunt and I don't give a damn about horns anymore. I've already got a roomfull of racks from 2.5 and 3.5 year old bucks and I don't have anything left to prove nor any use for more dust collectors. I killed my "trophy bucks" under conditions of intense hunting pressure {buck harvest of near 90% 1.5 year olds} in places where the QDM whiners said they didn't exist and have not the slightest sypathy nor desire to make things any easier on the lazy, pitiful bastards by passing up good meat so they can feel like mighty hunters a year or two later.

[southtexas]

Sabre:

Here is one thing that you said a few months back that we can all agree on:

"I may come off as overbearing or self righteous..."

[Renegade]

What I don't understand is when people say they are meat hunters and not concerned with antlers, then why must they shoot yearling buck when there's plenty of doe to be taken, and also more opportunity to do so. I don't get that. Venison is venison, there's no difference between male or female venison. I'm a meat hunter as well but I'll target the biggest doe unless there happens to be a decent legal buck that presents itself.

"in places where the QDM whiners said they didn't exist and have not the slightest sypathy nor desire to make things any easier on the lazy, pitiful bastards by passing up good meat so they can feel like mighty hunters a year or two later."

Not sure what a QDM whiner is, as I've never heard of one, but just how is it that a guy who patiently waits for an older buck is "lazy, pitiful" or a "bastard"; and how is it you would make things "easier" for them?

[Sabre]

Not sure what a QDM whiner is, as I've never heard of one, but just how is it that a guy who patiently waits for an older buck is "lazy, pitiful" or a "bastard"; and how is it you would make things "easier" for them?

The QDM whiners are pitiful and lazy because they'd rather whine that there aren't any "good bucks" out there and pass laws forbidding others from shooting young bucks than learn how to hunt and work their butts off for their trophies like those of us who did it repeatedly without any antler restrictions. They're bastards because they seek to pass laws restricting the freedom of choice of their fellow hunters and hence force their values onto others in order to get more of what "they" want/value. As to shooting does for meat, I'm perfectly willing to do that every season {and do} but doe tags are limited here and you can't count on getting one every year. Furthermore, one deer only lasts me about a month so even in the years when I get one or two doe tags I still want to fill my buck tag for the extra meat. I don't appreciate others trying to tell me their stupid wall decorations {antlers, which they could get without AR's if they werent such lazy and incompetent hunters} are more valuable than my groceries.

[GF.]

Boy, if I didn't think it'd fire up a serious pissing contest, I might even guess that you're already feeling some pressure to pass on those 1.5s......

But again, Sabre... This isn't about wanting easier hunting for bigger bucks, it's about wanting to get the herd in balance and the population in check.

And BTW.... This isn't to suggest that you need anything even resembling my 'permission' to do a blessed thing, but under any system that I, personally, would endorse, you would still have the legal option of shooting whatever buck you choose and you'd probably have the option of filling more doe tags than you currently do. There'd be no hit in the grocery budget if'n I were King for a Day because I'm the sort of guy who heads out with good intentions and normally ends up shooting whatever deer he gets a crack at as the season is winding down. JMO, but as 'excuses' for shooting yearling bucks go, 'my freezer is empty and we need the meat' is about as good as it gets....

But hey, look... If you're gonna leave those antlers in the woods anyway - and you have any kind of choice - why not leave 'em walking around with a young buck underneath?

[Sabre]

Boy, if I didn't think it'd fire up a serious pissing contest, I might even guess that you're already feeling some pressure to pass on those 1.5s......

Not in the least GF. In fact I've killed 1.5 year old bucks for the last 2 seasons and make no apologies for it. That's not saying I went out intentionally looking to kill a young buck but they happened to be the first legal bucks I saw and I needed the meat so I dropped 'em.

But again, Sabre... This isn't about wanting easier hunting for bigger bucks, it's about wanting to get the herd in balance and the population in check.

Horse puckey ! You can balance the herd and/or reduce the population by issuing more doe tags/killing more does and/or limiting the amount of buck tags. Antler restrictions are not needed to accomplish these things at all and exist solely to produce more "older bucks" meaning MORE and BIGGER ANTLERS for the lazy incompetent fools that can't kill a decent buck otherwise. Try to varnish antler restrictions over with any bogus "management" name you want {QDM} but this is the BOTTOM LINE that makes them so popular with the vast majority of hunters and they don't care about anything else.

And BTW.... This isn't to suggest that you need anything even resembling my 'permission' to do a blessed thing, but under any system that I, personally, would endorse, you would still have the legal option of shooting whatever buck you choose and you'd probably have the option of filling more doe tags than you currently do.

Ain't happenin' here GF. Our herd is in balance with the habitat and they're NOT going to be increasing the doe tags hereabouts anytime soon.