Coyote Issue-Georgia study

[Ray Hammond]

There's a SC study just completed that says in the lower portion of the state of south Carolina which includes Hog Heaven and Bacon Strip we are enjoying a 70% fawn mortality due to coyotes

We need to start a aggressive hunting program for them. I think a reduction in trapping activity has also exacerbated the situation.  There used to be a guy or two in every town that trapped- now you hardly see it being done.

[snag]

..."but until recently game managers in Georgia have been reluctant to acknowledge the impact of predation and the relatively exponential impact when combined with radical doe harvests."

Sounds like Oregon. The difference is we have cougar and bear and now wolves along with coyotes. At this rate the anti-hunters won't have to spend a dime to stop our hunting opportunities. The predators will take the game numbers down to a point where a lot of hunters will find something else to do or hunt out of state. We have seen this happen.

[T Lail]

when I here people state in SC and GA state that on their property they have taken over a 100 does per year for the last 5 -6 years and with the coyote issues...add it up....here in NC (NW part of state) we may only see 10 to 15 deer the ENTIRE season, but the DNR says game populations are exploding.....it's a mess boys and it may be too late to turn it around any time soon....  

[Jake Diebolt]

guk, you've got an interesting scenario there. For my money, I'd bet that at some point one species or the other is going to win. Depends on what happens habitat-wise. Wolves are more adapted to big woods, coyotes to fragmented habitats like fields and strips of bush. Either the wolves won't be able to sustain themselves in fragmented habitat, the coyotes will get eaten and reduced, or (and here is the scary scenario) the wolves will be reduced in numbers until they interbreed with the coyotes. This is why northern coyotes are bigger than in teh south - more genetic contact with wolves. So you end up with the flexibility and cunning of a coyote, only almost as big as a wolf (similar to coydogs - crossbred coyotes and feral dogs)

Like I said above, predation is a factor, but not the only one, and the hardest to tackle effectively.

Mortality numbers are real tricky, too. When they say coyotes kill 70% of fawns, you have to consider how many may have died anyways. When a human hunter kills a healthy, mature buck, it's a pretty good chance a coyote isn't going to kill it. But if a hunter kills a small doe or a first year spike, there's a good chance a predator would have gotten it anyway. This is why game management is a crap shoot. There's so little quality information around, the best you can go by is sightings by hunters, which aren't reliable in a statistical analysis sort of way. And no one, at least here in Ontario, has the money to do any actual studies. So it's mostly guesswork. What's killing the deer isn't the whole story - it's what's killing the deer in addition to other mortality. If coyotes were killing only healthy deer, then 70 percent is a crazy number. But if 50 percent of those deer they kill would have died in winter or from disease anyway, then the statistic starts looking less alarming.

 The most bang for your buck policy is reducing doe harvests. That will work immediately, as each doe can have 2 fawns. At a certain point you get predator saturation in the population where the coyotes simply can't eat the fawns fast enough. Reducint predator populations in the scenarios listed above is a good idea too, but it's not going to have the immediate relief to a deer population like reducing does killed.

That 100 does in 5 years stat above is scary. I don't care how few coyotes you have, that's a recipe for disaster.Reduce that to 1 doe a year, and you have 95 more does in the population having fawns. As long as your sex ratio doesn't get to like 8 to 1 for does-bucks, your population will do much better (although this policy won't breed for big bucks, just for lots of deer). Then bring the doe permits up - reasonably - when the population starts to overheat again.

[Brock]

They had similar report in SC....I read just this past year.  Our herd used to be estimated well over 1M animals but is now in the 700-800,000 range they think.

We have always had a liberal season even though every game zone sets their own dates and limits...here in coastal region I can hunt from 15 aug-1 jan.

they instituted doe tags that could be purchased if you did not want to only hunt on DOE DAYS....to help control the herd a couple decades ago maybe less.

now they are saying with the entrenched coyote population they assess up to 70% fawn mortality rate. WTF???

DNR guy I talked to said.....you need to shoot 8 out of 10 hogs you see just to keep up with them on your property...no matter the size or age or sex.  You need to shoot EVERY SINGLE coyote to just keep up without falling too far behind...year round.

it is a problem...that will not go away on its own.

[eminart]

Nature is a balance. If it's out of balance, it's our fault, not the coyotes.

Deer seem to have always done quite well in TX which has always been overrun with coyotes.

[Brock]

yeah but coyotes are not native to the east.....so it is making larger impact in my opinion.  drought, heat, wide open spaces, less density per mile food sources than east if I was to guess....

so nothing to help keep them in check....plus more population with large cities surrounded by forests and you have a buffet for the yotes.

[huntmaster80]

It is all over the U.S. that the Game Commission is making poor choices when it comes to deer management.  In Pa we used to see lots of deer when we had a two day doe season and limited tags.  Now we see few deer and the area that I live in has almost  4 months of doe season and one can kill as many as they want for 7$ a tag.

[eminart]

Originally posted by Brock:
yeah but coyotes are not native to the east.....so it is making larger impact in my opinion.  drought, heat, wide open spaces, less density per mile food sources than east if I was to guess....

so nothing to help keep them in check....plus more population with large cities surrounded by forests and you have a buffet for the yotes.

Nah, there's still the same number of prey animals per predator. If coyotes are moving in, they're taking the niche of something else. Wolves, bears, and mountain lions were all native to the east/southeast but are now very rare in most of this region. That, and the fact that man has managed deer herds so that their numbers are higher than ever, has allowed coyotes to flourish here.

[Blaino]

I agree with Ray and Brock!  When I was a kid there wasn't such thing as not seeing a deer when you went hunting. You AlWAYS saw 1 or 2 or 20.

This past year was the worst yet for me.  I hunt in the lower part of the state (which is supposed to have more deer) with 4 other guys.  I checked my book and I didn't SEE a deer until my 9th trip!

It's very frustrating with 17 "doe days" and every hunter can buy 5 doe tags.  Every hunter can kill 21 does a year!!!!

Most young does have 2 fawns a year.... that’s a lot of deer that aren't around any longer to replenish the herd.

Oh yea plus the Coyotes!!!!

             

[gringol]

Originally posted by Brock:
yeah but coyotes are not native to the east.....so it is making larger impact in my opinion.  drought, heat, wide open spaces, less density per mile food sources than east if I was to guess....

so nothing to help keep them in check....plus more population with large cities surrounded by forests and you have a buffet for the yotes.

I'm pretty sure coyotes are native to the east.  In fact they have thrived all over North America for a lot longer than humans.  The population of yotes is growing because we haven't killed enough of them.  If we all devoted 1/3 the time we spend hunting deer to hunting yotes I don't think we'd be having this conversation...

[Ray Hammond]

Jake,

We don't have winter kill in SC or Georgia...heck, where I hunt in SC they have as high as 80 deer per square mile!

There's no issue with food as we've got an 11 month growing season and a never fail acorn crop as well as plenty of soft mast and browse, plus we also maintain grass planting and food plots.

Eminart,there haven't been mountain lions or bears in SC in measurable numbers since the Pleistocene. Don't correct me if I'm wrong...just chalk it up to me being too long out of school to remember the actual period, but it was a long long long time ago, OK?

If you are going to count that way then we have less prey animals because we used to have elk and bison in SC....let's not go all gooey for coyotes-they're not native- they were brought in by fox hunters who thought they knew better than anyone else- and yes, much like the armadillo, also by natural migration- but make no mistake- they aren't native to SC or GA.

Eight years ago- never heard a coyote in SC coastal plain where I hunt.  Now, nearly every night, five or 6 packs sound off like crazy, chase and kill critters.

Our deer have nearly no experience with them and thus, you have the issue.  I'm certain over fifteen generations or so the herd will develop/is developing methods of dealing with them, but since we already manipulate the crap out of everything we need to do our part as stewards and try to bring about a balance by knocking back the excess coyotes which are present because they are being TOO successful at killing whitetails in SC.

[eminart]

Originally posted by Ray Hammond:
Jake,


If you are going to count that way then we have less prey animals because we had elk and bison in SC....l

And now that we don't have elk and bison, the deer population has grown because there's more food for them. This is what I'm saying. Nature is a balance. I promise you, it doesn't need our help. Now, if you're talking about contorting it to our own wants (larger herds of whitetail), then yeah killing all the other predators will leave more deer for people. But, then people MUST kill those deer to prevent overpopulation.

[Ray Hammond]

That's kind of the idea, isn't it?

[eminart]

Originally posted by Ray Hammond:
That's kind of the idea, isn't it?

Maybe for some.

I like the idea of having full range of wildlife and not just a herd of prey animals. I think there are plenty of deer for the coyotes and people too.

[Blaino]

Originally posted by eminart:
 

Originally posted by Ray Hammond:
That's kind of the idea, isn't it?

Maybe for some.

I like the idea of having full range of wildlife and not just a herd of prey animals. I think there are plenty of deer for the coyotes and people too. [/b]

I'm going to disagree!  If DNR reports that 70% of fawns are eatin by coyotes then it wont be long before the coyotes don't have fawns to eat.

lets just say that DNR's math was off by 20%.... thats still half of all fawns every year are killed by coyotes.

[gringol]

Originally posted by eminart:
 

Originally posted by Ray Hammond:
That's kind of the idea, isn't it?

Maybe for some.

I like the idea of having full range of wildlife and not just a herd of prey animals. I think there are plenty of deer for the coyotes and people too. [/b]

Realistically that isn't how it works.  Nature should be balanced, but we need to acknowledge that our species has completely mucked up the balance and it will never return to equilibrium while the human species survives.  Between  all the hunters you know, how many deer were harvested last year and how many coyotes were harvested last year? Most people don't enjoy coyote hunting nearly as much as deer hunting.  The vast majority of conservation dollars come from hunters.  If hunters are successful, they'll eventually quit hunting and conservation dollars will decrease.  See where this is going?  

We need to manage the coyote population just like any other game animal population.

[eminart]

Originally posted by gringol:
 

Originally posted by eminart:
 

Originally posted by Ray Hammond:
That's kind of the idea, isn't it?

Maybe for some.

I like the idea of having full range of wildlife and not just a herd of prey animals. I think there are plenty of deer for the coyotes and people too. [/b]

Realistically that isn't how it works.  Nature should be balanced, but we need to acknowledge that our species has completely mucked up the balance and it will never return to equilibrium while the human species survives.  Between  all the hunters you know, how many deer were harvested last year and how many coyotes were harvested last year? Most people don't enjoy coyote hunting nearly as much as deer hunting.  The vast majority of conservation dollars come from hunters.  If hunters are successful, they'll eventually quit hunting and conservation dollars will decrease.  See where this is going?  

We need to manage the coyote population just like any other game animal population. [/b]

I disagree.

We manage the fox population less than the coyote. Yet they don't overpopulate because their numbers are based on game numbers. We don't kill ANY birds of prey, some of which compete with us for game birds and small game. Yet, their numbers somehow remain constant according to available game.

What is different with the coyote? Only that they kill deer, and deer is our favorite game.

Coyotes are self-regulating. In years with scarce game, they produce fewer, or no pups. So, if you want less coyotes, kill more deer (and especially rabbits, mice, voles, cotton rats, and grasshoppers). If you want more coyotes, kill fewer deer.

I'm not saying that coyotes aren't affecting the deer herds at all. But, if anything is being damaged beyond quick repair, it's being done by people.

[pitt98]

Agree with Eminart 100%.

[FerretWYO]

I had the oppertunity to listen to a gentleman who has been involved in the presator managment line of work for many many years this last march. The findings of his studies were amazing and align in most ways with the study mentioned.