wildlife winterkill?

[JMF]

To respond to a few of you that have said this is normal and we have die offs every so often is partially correct. What is not so normal anymore is the lack of winter cover for any animals just not deer and pheasants. Almost all tree rows have been ripped out, no crp, no section lines and since we had a fairly dry fall most of the slew bottoms were either cut, plowed or burned. So if you take in account the lack of winter cover a normal ND winter is a deadly winter for our wildlife now a days. Not trying to be gloom and doom but if you were to drive around in the country of the north central to NW part of the state you soon would ask yourself how in the hell would anything survive 3 months with nothing.

Those things provide absolutely no cover and do almost no good in conditions like these. They need heavy thermal cover, ie. large tree plantings at least 11 rows thick.

 

[snowkiller]

Seen a few dead pheasants around the lake

 

[MarbleEyez]

Was out Saturday, buddy wanted to get the dog out one last time and chase some roosters (perfect day for it ). We were busting through the snow in the low bottoms/drainage creeks in the fields. Got to the cat tails that were snow blown in and it was an eruption of birds. There was burrows and tunnels going through there like a maze. Dogs didn't know which way to point! The fields have bare spots to trace amounts in them and all section lines are blown in. After this last snowfall on Sat out total is around 11"-15" depending where your at, this is SW ND.

Birds are pulling through, they are bunched up (as always this time of year) and out in the fields scratching. There is all kinds of food in the wind blown spots in the stubble fields.

Watched a herd of 100+ deer come into a 25ac corn stubble field. They are all looking fat and happy, other then a little cold.

All these people saying "Better shoot them while we can, because after this winter their isn't going to be anything left" are a little out in left field in my opinion. It's not like these deer were imported from Florida and have no idea what winter weather is.

Yes, some deer and pheasants are going to die, that is the workings of mother nature. But not every pheasant and deer in the state of ND is going to stiffen up, starve and freeze to death. I would highly bet that the dead deer that people are seeing now are the causalities of "marginal shot placement" from rifle deer season and the weather helped put them out of commission . I ran across one the other night running across the road, only thing I had in the truck was my pistol. Tried to put her out of her misery, but couldn't comfortably reach out that far, especially in the headlights.

 

[3Roosters]

My almost 2 yr old pup/dog and I plan to get out a couple more times before the close of pheasant season to hopefully drop a few roosters before they freeze to death. Will for sure bring the snowshoes. This bird season has been going by way to quickly and that makes me sad and my pup also.

 

[db-2]

It's a bitch and earlier by the north central border.
My son and I were bring feed up to one of our food plots. Borrow a track side by side. Will admit they can go through a lot and nice to have a heated cab. Last year was able to make it up there all year with the vehicle but no way this year. Corn is 3/bushel and screenage 25/pickup load. Screens do look good with a bunch of corn and other grains in it. Will work with two of our sites and hopefully the corn stalks and winter greens last in the others.
Following tracks back and about 20 feet from us a fawn came out of the snow. It was bury in the snow like the birds do. First time I have seen that. Grouse and some partridge again this year bury in the snow. More feed today and it is starting out to be a long cold winter.
Corn was about 9 feet tall and now snow is up close to covering cobs up. winter greens are cover but they are doing their best to uncover. Hope for the best and will be putting out funds until spring is here. db

 

[dean nelson]

Was out Saturday, buddy wanted to get the dog out one last time and chase some roosters (perfect day for it ). We were busting through the snow in the low bottoms/drainage creeks in the fields. Got to the cat tails that were snow blown in and it was an eruption of birds. There was burrows and tunnels going through there like a maze. Dogs didn't know which way to point! The fields have bare spots to trace amounts in them and all section lines are blown in. After this last snowfall on Sat out total is around 11"-15" depending where your at, this is SW ND.

Birds are pulling through, they are bunched up (as always this time of year) and out in the fields scratching. There is all kinds of food in the wind blown spots in the stubble fields.

Watched a herd of 100+ deer come into a 25ac corn stubble field. They are all looking fat and happy, other then a little cold.

All these people saying "Better shoot them while we can, because after this winter their isn't going to be anything left" are a little out in left field in my opinion. It's not like these deer were imported from Florida and have no idea what winter weather is.

Yes, some deer and pheasants are going to die, that is the workings of mother nature. But not every pheasant and deer in the state of ND is going to stiffen up, starve and freeze to death. I would highly bet that the dead deer that people are seeing now are the causalities of "marginal shot placement" from rifle deer season and the weather helped put them out of commission . I ran across one the other night running across the road, only thing I had in the truck was my pistol. Tried to put her out of her misery, but couldn't comfortably reach out that far, especially in the headlights.

Of course they looked fat we have only had snow on the ground for two weeks! Go back and check on those deer 8 weeks from now and see how they are doing and let that be the judge.

 

[BDub]

If the weather improves a bunch the wildlife should be OK. But now at least in the middle of the state wildlife is using lots of energy to feed. This will take a toll sooner or later. January most likely will not be nice, plus more snow on the way.

 

[dean nelson]

I'm right there with you bud. one good January thaw could be a big game changer as well. unfortunately one of the things we're going to need to keep a very close eye on even though there's nothing we can do about it with this much snow starting to form on top of the ice and that's not a good deal at all. with many lakes going into freeze up a bit low and now heavy snow pack we may end up finding ourselves in a very bad fish kill this spring.

 

[KDM]

The critters around here seem to be doing JUST fine. Our buckets in the back yard are only getting a half dozen visitors a night and most are fawns. They haven't even bothered with the hay bales. The rest of the deer are out in the alfalfa, corn, and soybean fields doing their thing. The pheasants I have shot recently have all had full crops of either soybeans or corn so even they are finding food. I'm not going to get too worked up until I start to see much larger numbers of deer coming in. As long as they can replace the calories burned to keep warm, they should get along fine. I'll keep a vigilant watch though. One good storm and ugliness can appear right quick.

 

[db-2]

Found a young buck dead at food plot. On camera the day before and looked okay. Two coyotes eating on it. No rifle and coyotes did not run away. Drug deer close to road and possible shot coming up. Db

 

[tman]

Was out walking sloughs for roosters in central part of state and found about a half dozen dead ones with just their tails sticking out of the snow.

 

[guywhofishes]

Was out walking sloughs for roosters in central part of state and found about a half dozen dead ones with just their tails sticking out of the snow.

Crap!!

 

[Kickemup]

Was out walking sloughs for roosters in central part of state and found about a half dozen dead ones with just their tails sticking out of the snow.

Thats the one bad part about pheasants. They are flat out stupid when it comes it winter around here. They hunker down in a blizzard and get buried instead of moving occasionally.

 

[3Roosters]

Was out walking sloughs for roosters in central part of state and found about a half dozen dead ones with just their tails sticking out of the snow.

Dang! That is 2 more that I probably would have missed while shooting at with my dog wondering "when in the hell are you going to drop something?" ;:;boohoo

 

[MarbleEyez]

Was out looking for sheds this past week. I've ran across 4 dead deer total. This was in a high concentration area where the deer were wintering through the tough part of the winter. I didn't think that was bad considering there was 100+ deer in there on any given evening from the middle of December to the end of January.

 

[guywhofishes]

good to hear!

 

[dean nelson]

Here's hoping that that January/February thaw we had was enough to save most of them. Sure would be nice to get the benefits of a snowy winter without all the negatives for once.

 

[guywhofishes]

we caught an AMAZING break - miraculous IMO

 

[gst]

Not so lucky up north, that cold snap in March and the two day blizzard was haaard on the deer. One dead one was laying in the shop under the tractor, two more were in a cattle shed. We had roughly 550 -600 deer all winter and have found around 40 or 50 dead so maybe 10% isn;t that bad. Found a couple bucks with some big pedicules so wondeirng if the good sheds we were looking forward to this year are done for.

Wondering what we will find in the fields once the show is gone.

 

[dean nelson]

Well the big boys and the kids are normally the first to go in a bad winters. If they don't get a chance to recuperate after rut it can get pretty rough on those old boys.