As a biologist I deal with aspects of fish and wildlife behavior on a routine basis. Hardly a week goes by that I don’t get at least one phone call or email from someone who witnessed an odd, strange, or erratic animal behavior, or saw something in an unusual location. Especially when it comes to deer hunting in North Dakota.

After nearly two decades in the field, I have learned to “never say never.” Even if I get a call on a pink flamingo in a storm-water retention pond, my initial response would be “could be, you just never know.”

That’s always a safe response without the benefit of a first-hand look. I did one time express doubt regarding a call about a kangaroo stuck in a fence. And my suspicion was confirmed when it was later determined the animal was actually a young deer attempting to kick its way loose.

This winter a few people have asked about seeing fewer deer and smaller herds of deer in areas where hunters or landowners for the last several years may have seen deer bunched up in larger groups.

As with many outdoor issues, weather, habitat and populations all tend to play a part in what is seen or not seen across the prairie.

Out of the gate, I’ll explain that a lack of visible groups of deer is not necessarily a bad sign from the perspective of a biologist or a landowner. Just a short year ago the extreme cold, piles of snow and long winter created many reported deer depredation situations across North Dakota where dozens and sometimes even hundreds of deer gathered near food sources.

One reason deer aren’t as visible as last year is simply that over much of the state, the landscape through late January was more brown than white. Deer just don’t stand out as much as they do against a white background.

Secondly, deer can find something to eat just about anywhere this winter so they aren’t nearly so congregated around isolated food sources. We may still have some large gatherings of deer in places, but for the most part those situations are more of an exception than the rule this year.

A third factor that might explain why some people are seeing fewer deer this winter is that the state likely has fewer deer. In addition to three severe winters in a row, the North Dakota Game and Fish Department, through hunting pressure on antlerless deer with rifles, bows and muzzleloaders, has been trying to reduce the statewide deer population for the last five years or more.

The winters served to accelerate the population reduction. This year, the management strategy will be to try to increase deer numbers in most units. For a couple of years, and possibly more depending on weather and habitat changes, that will mean fewer licenses available than in other recent hunting seasons.

Whether it’s icefishing, predator hunting, work, family vacation or sports travel with the kids, if you’re traveling across North Dakota this winter, don’t be shocked if you don’t see deer gathered in the same places they were the last few years.

It’s understandable that people would express concern over not seeing so many deer this year, but for the most part, that’s probably a good sign for deer hunting.

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Sage Grouse Hunting

Because of a long-term population decline throughout their native range, in 2010 the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service considered listing sage grouse under the Endangered Species Act.

Since sage grouse inhabit the extreme southwestern part of North Dakota, this development was of particular interest within the State Game and Fish Department. Listing under the ESA basically means the federal government, specifically the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, would assume primary sage grouse management instead of the states.

The FWS determined that listing was warranted, but other species had a higher priority for federal recovery efforts. However, the FWS is scheduled to revisit sage grouse listing again in 2015, and at that time, one of the determining factors will be whether a regional sage grouse management plan is in place.

The effort to develop that plan is just getting started across the western United States, with public meetings in all states in the sage grouse range. The U.S. Bureau of Land Management is leading the effort, because more than 50 percent of the nation’s sage grouse are found on BLM land. In North Dakota a majority of the state’s sage grouse, and the largest leks, are found within BLM land in Bowman County, according to Aaron Robinson, Game and Fish Department upland game biologist.

Robinson participated in North Dakota’s public meeting in Bowman in mid-January. He says the next step is for the states and federal agencies to work through the public comments and build them into a comprehensive range-wide management plan that provides for sage grouse conservation and protection by late 2014.

Game and Fish Director Terry Steinwand says that while North Dakota is on the periphery of the sage grouse range and doesn’t have many of these native birds compared to states farther west, the state still has an important role in the long-term recovery plan. “Sage grouse have had a rough time the past decade or more, not just here, but in all the Western states where they exist,” Steinwand said “We’re committed to using whatever resources we can to help get those birds stabilized and headed in the other direction.”

In North Dakota, Steinwand added, a number of projects are already underway.
Highlights of Game and Fish involvement over the past several years include:

• Game and Fish has funded research over the past six years to determine species demographics such as survival, nest success, bird movements and reproduction success.
• Helped form a working group, in conjunction with a core group of local landowners, to provide information to agricultural producers about sage grouse conservation.
• Worked closely with the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service and BLM on extensive sagebrush plantings designed to connect fragmented areas and provide incentives to local landowners.
• Provided funding and piggybacked with federal programs to provide incentives for private landowners to implement grazing practices that increase residual grass cover that benefits sage grouse.

“We’re going to continue our efforts, in cooperation with other agencies and private landowners, to work on projects to benefit sage grouse,” Steinwand said. “It’s in the best interest of all the states in sage grouse range to keep these birds off the endangered species list.”

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Over the holidays I bumped into an old high school friend, and true to form for a couple of guys who love the outdoors and also have young families, we began sharing memories of outdoor activities.

Living in Montana, Jon has had the opportunity to hunt elk in the same manner we hunt pheasants or ducks, and his kids are right there with him. His eyes sparkled like the ripples on an early-morning lake when he proudly relayed how his daughter, on an outing back in North Dakota, had bagged her first pheasant. “And my dad was along, too.”

This had special meaning to me as well, since Jon’s dad is Mr. Stites, one of my high school math teachers.

For a kid needing a solid math and science background – when even in high school  a “C” in math was an “A” in my book – Mr. Stites had a way of making sure I was armed with the knowledge and skills to survive college statistics, calculus and trigonometry. All with a “C” for good measure. But I made it.

And from the sounds of it, Jon was working on the honor roll of the outdoors. The tone of his voice and the excitement in his explanations were a testament to family ties created through outdoor adventure.

While the conversation was merely minutes, it felt like hours as we shared stories back and forth, between bites of a manhandler pizza. Weeks later, on one of my many winter drives with no purpose other than just making sure it’s all still out there, I replayed that conversation and marveled at the role the outdoors plays not only in our lives, but the lives of many current and former North Dakota residents.

All this occurred at roughly the same time I passed the mark of four decades on earth, and quite frankly I’m not sure whether to grasp the philosophy that “age is just a number,” or “you’re only as old as you feel.”

Either way, heading toward half-a decade is kind of like getting a new gadget figured out. Once you know how it works, you can enjoy it a little more rather than struggling to figure it out.

We all face our own struggles, and with a little thought you realize it’s relative to each individual. There’s always someone doing better than you, and others not doing as well. The outdoors sometimes is a place to gain perspective, think through tough decisions and internally reboot our system.

Upon returning home from that drive, I wrote a Jon note and thanked him for the conversation and the privilege of meeting his family. It’s reassuring to know that while pursuit of a trophy elk, a limit of ducks or a lunker walleye can be part of the outdoors, for most of us there’s more to it than that.

Time spent with family and friends, and little things like simply breathing fresh air or hearing the call of spring’s first meadowlark, are just as significant.

I’ve known for years that we would all do well to share the outdoors with a friend, child or neighbor who’s never experienced it. Somewhere along the line they’ll thank you for the memories of outdoor activities.

And besides, when life sends you a curve, have you ever heard anyone say, “I just need to watch some TV or play a video game?”

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While many hunters and anglers associate spring and summer with fishing season and fall with hunting season, truth be told, in North Dakota fishing is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week and 365 days each year.

And while hunting season is generally considered a fall season, with small game and archery deer open into January, along with spring turkey and snow goose conservation hunts, and an early resident Canada goose season that starts in mid-August, hunting’s off season is shorter than it once was.

Another “season” of sorts that begins slowly in late fall and picks up steam through and well into the spring thaw, is the meeting and banquet season.

From local rod, gun and wildlife club annual meetings to regional banquets sponsored by national organizations, I’d bet dollars to donuts there’s a banquet or annual gathering somewhere in North Dakota weekend from here through April. It’s an opportunity for like-minded individuals to gather and often raise money for the next year’s habitat, youth or other outdoor events.

Along the way, participants share stories of the past year and make plans for the future.

Another important tradition of the “off” season is the North Dakota Game and Fish Department district advisory board meetings, held each fall just after deer gun season and again in early spring. These meetings provide hunters, anglers, landowners and others a chance to meet face-to-face with Game and Fish staff, to share information and concerns.

Recent advisory board meetings were dominated by discussions on deer, pheasants and fishing. While each meeting had its local issues, everything from muskrats to mountain lions, the 2011 deer season was on the minds of many.

In 2011, the Game and Fish Department allocated less than 110,000 deer licenses, down from more than 149,000 in 2008. The reasons for a declining deer population are many and hunters are concerned about winter weather, loss of Conservation Reserve Program grasslands, archery success rate, and other mortality factors such as predators.

It’s safe to say that when the 2012 deer applications are available, a further reduction in deer licenses is likely.

Pheasant hunting was not as widespread of a topic, though hunters and Game and Fish biologists are certainly concerned about the loss of more than a million acres of CRP habitat in the last five years, with another 800,000-plus acres scheduled to come out of the program in 2012. On top that, severe winters have reduced pheasant numbers across the state. The mild start to this winter at least provides some hope for less winter mortality than the past three years.

Amid the concerns about deer and pheasants is a rather bright future for fish. When the new fishing regulations take effect April 1, Game and Fish is proposing to increase the daily limit on northern pike from three to five across the state.

With many new or expanding water bodies holding pike, many fisheries managers, and anglers agree that greater use of the pike resource is a good option.

As you enjoy the “meeting” season those are just a few of the topics likely come up … along with inevitable stories of the “one that got away” last year.

Leier is a biologist with the Game and Fish Department. He can be reached by email: dleier@nd.gov.

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After a couple of cups of coffee and the usual bantering about weather at my favorite corner convenience store, a recent discussion turned to Game and Fish Department surveys.

Not the kind for which biologists annually count deer or ducks, but the kind that just about every hunter or angler receives from time to time, asking questions about harvests and days afield.

Surveys are not a hot topic compared to discussion on deer numbers or other wide ranging subjects such as the potential for the Twins or how to fix the Vikings. But in my mind, it’s a topic that worth a little more pondering. I wonder if hunters and anglers truly understand the importance of these post-season surveys?

Here in the Midwest, we have a tendency to under-estimate the influence of our own participation in everything from ushering at church to attending any public meeting. I’ll loosely compare it to poaching or hunting violations. If it bothers you, then do more than kick the ground and mutter your frustrations. Engage and pick up the phone and call the Report-All-Poachers hotline (800) 472-2121.

The same goes for surveys. When they arrive in the mail, take the time to quickly, factually and accurately complete them.

Jerry Gulke, the Game and Fish Department’s data processing coordinator, says that deer bow, small game, waterfowl and fall turkey hunting questionnaires were recently mailed to randomly selected hunters. “The number of surveys returned to us has been declining in recent years to where it is becoming a problem,” Gulke said on “Outdoors Online,” the Game and Fish Department’s weekly webcast news program. “We really need the data.”

Over the years I’ve had several people question whether they need to return a survey even if they didn’t harvest anything. Whether you hunted dozens of days, one day or not at all, the statistical information is all needed, even if you didn’t hunt at all.

“The harvest survey is very important because it allows us to evaluate the hunting season,” Gulke said. “What we are able to determine includes the number of hunters, amount of hunting activity and size of the harvest.”

I can personally attest that the volume of physical mail in my mailbox has shrunk in recent years. For the most part, my bills and much correspondence arrives via electronic or paperless communication. So the excuse of the survey being lost in the mail might not fly, and if you do accidentally toss it out, a follow-up survey will be mailed to those not responding to the first survey, with the idea that a second notification will convince the recipient that he or she is not just a victim of a mass mailing.

I’ve also been asked why Game and Fish doesn’t conduct the surveys all electronically. While respondents can go online and fill out surveys instead of mailing in the paper version, ask yourself how many other surveys you get at checkouts, on receipts or via email?

I’d suggest that human nature might give more merit to a Game and Fish Department survey when it’s found in the mailbox and not the email inbox.

Before you advise me to “get with the times,” trust me. I am with the times, and it’s much easier to click delete than to move an envelope into a stack of action lists on the desk.

In fact I’d rather fill out a postage-paid paper survey than pay a bill. I can’t be the only one who finds it more pleasant recalling past hunts than paying current bills.

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The older I get the faster time seems to pass. My neighbor and friend Mick explained a few years ago it’s a function of the percentage of life.

Case in point is remembering the vivid details of my first trip to the old outdoor movie theatre in Valley City more than three decades ago, watching Clint Eastwood with my Mom, Dad and sister. I even remember we had taco-flavored Doritos as a snack.

But fast forward to this past spring and I struggle to recall the when and where of my first fishing trip of the season. Perhaps it’s not a bad thing to forget about last year. As I mentioned in my column last week, many of us can’t wait to put up a new calendar and hope for improvements in the year to come.

One of the first positive signs is access for ice fishing. While the moderate weather in December hasn’t produced much ice fit for driving yet, at least people can get on lakes, and it should be a banner year for both ice and open water fishing.

In the November 2011 issue of North Dakota Outdoors magazine, State Game and Fish Department fisheries chief Greg Power wrote, regarding pike fishing in 2012: “North Dakota now has more than 200 lakes with pike, including the Missouri River System and the Devils Lake chain. As a result of outstanding natural reproduction the last three years, many of these waters have never harbored so many northerns.

“The hope is that ice anglers will catch a break this winter and have easy access to the abundant pike populations. Although many pike are currently young and relatively small, fish of 5 pounds or more should weigh heavily in the mix.”

That same article lists a number of lakes with good pike fishing prospects, either this winter or heading into next summer and beyond. If you’re not a subscriber to the magazine, the article is online at the Game and Fish website, gf.nd.gov.

The Game and Fish website also features a publication that will guide anglers to effectively taking the bones out of pike.

In addition to northerns, abundant precipitation and increasing water levels the past three years has benefitted most fish species in the state. Unlike game birds that grow from egg to adult-sized in just a few months, most fish take a few years to reach “keeper” size, and those from the good class of 2009 may start reaching that threshold in 2012.

Water, of course, benefits ducks and geese as well. While the state could use a little bit of snow runoff or spring rain to recharge temporary wetlands, prospects for waterfowl production in prairie pothole country remain good, barring a hot, dry spring and early summer.

Abundant water has also meant a resurgence in muskrat populations. Game and Fish has been getting a fair amount of interest from people thinking of giving trapping a try, as prices for furs of several species are up heading into the new year.

The mild December also bodes well for pheasants and deer. While anything can happen the rest of the winter, all resident wildlife have had a relatively stress-free start. That gives us reason for optimism in 2012.

I’m looking forward to it.

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For a lot of North Dakotans, the end of 2011 can’t come fast enough.

While none of us can predict exactly how the coming year will unfold, for the state as a whole, and most wildlife in particular, 2012 just has to bring improvement, doesn’t it?

As a biologist, I’m always interested in how weather and habitat influence individual species. It’s also important to keep in mind a historical perspective. As we head out of 2011, here’s a rundown on some of the lows and highs of the year and where that leaves us heading into a new year.

Despite three years in a row of declines, the statewide white-tailed deer population is still actually above levels from the 1980s and most years before that. The State Game and Fish Department, however, is looking to expand the population for deer hunting season to where it was a couple of years ago.

To do that will require a reduction in the number of antlerless whitetail licenses. How many years that will be necessary will depend in part on the severity of winters, and at least so far, 2011 is going out on a good note in that regard.

However long it takes for whitetails to rebound, recovery for mule deer will likely take longer. Observations during the department’s fall mule deer survey indicated production in 2011 was the lowest since the demographic survey began in 1954.

Bruce Stillings, Game and Fish big game supervisor in Dickinson, said observers counted 1,055 mule deer in the October survey, compared to 1,613 in 2010. While the buck-to-doe ratio of 0.47 was similar to the long-term average of 0.43 bucks per doe, the fawn-to-doe ratio of 0.59 was the lowest on record, well below the long-term average of 0.93 fawns per doe.

As such, a further reduction in the number of mule deer licenses is likely for 2012, with a possibility of no mule deer doe licenses.

Of course, pheasants also had a down year in 2011. Near-record snowfall that hurt pheasants, however, improved conditions for waterfowl that were already good the previous year.

The extra snow runoff also added depth to many lakes, adding to potential for good fish populations for years to come. While walleye and northern pike natural reproduction varied, the 2011 salmon spawning run on Lake Sakakawea and the Missouri River was a success. This will allow Game and Fish to stock Sakakawea with 250,000 salmon, a much higher level than just a few years ago.

And finally, to help North Dakota hunters make vacation plans and lodging reservations for hunting seasons in 2012, the Game and Fish Department annually provides tentative opening dates for the coming year.

Some popular hunting seasons will have opening day arrive nearly a week later in 2012 due to the calendar change. For example, opening day of pheasant season is tentatively the second Saturday in October, which in 2012 is Oct. 13.

The anticipated opening day for deer, which falls on the Friday prior to Veterans Day, is Nov. 9, the second Friday of November. In 2011, opening day for deer was Nov. 4.

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When it comes to trying something new, I’ll admit I usually need a good reason to change or replace anything in my routine.

From breakfast to fishing, after nearly four decades on earth I still gravitate toward my preferred options – sausage and eggs for breakfast and worms and bluegills for fishing.

The last time you tried something new, did you have a hint of apprehension, or at least a little adrenaline rush triggered by anticipation? I’ll try a new sausage, but my eggs must be scrambled. I’m not that daring.

While ice fishing for northern pike darkhouse spearfishing in North Dakota has little to do with breakfast preferences, it’s one of those experiences that warranted some apprehension, and generated anticipation when the first season opened in 2001.

Anglers, fisheries managers, and even people who didn’t fish had many questions   when darkhouse spearfishing for northern pike began in December 2001. Though many open-water and ice anglers did not favor spearing at the time, the state legislature passed a bill requiring a spearing season, and since then the State Game and Fish Department has worked methodically to design a season that is practical, provides opportunities in most areas of the state, and still protects the resource.

Water clarity is a major consideration. Each water body is unique. Some lakes with seemingly acceptable water clarity may become cloudy at ice-up, making spearing difficult. As such, different lakes show up on the list of most popular spearing destinations from year to year, depending on water clarity.

Spearing is covered under the regular fishing license, but people who want to spear must register with Game and Fish. Registration is free and available at the Department’s website gf.nd.gov and allows the Department to monitor the number of registered spearers, and follow up with surveys

The 2011 spearfishing season opened on most state waters Dec. 1, with the exception of Spiritwood Lake which opens Jan. 1. The season runs through March 15. Legal fish are northern pike and nongame species.

Darkhouse spearing is allowed for all residents with a valid fishing license and for residents under the age of 16. Nonresidents may darkhouse spearfish in North Dakota if they are from states that offer the same privilege for North Dakota residents. Minnesota, South Dakota and Montana allow spearing by nonresidents, essentially allowing reciprocal opportunities.

In the inaugural 2001-02 season 1,255 individuals registered to spear. Seventy-four percent indicated that they actually ventured onto the ice and tried their luck.

The average weight of pike harvested was 6-7 pounds.

Since then, the number of registered spearers has varied from around 1,200 up to 1,700. Annual harvest varies widely as well, depending on lake accessibility and water clarity.

Even in years with the highest overall spearing efforts, Game and Fish surveys indicate spearing harvest is just a small percentage of the overall pike harvest by open water and ice anglers.

Like eggs Benedict, spearing certainly isn’t for everyone, but if you’ve never tried it, don’t let another 10 years pass.

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In the early 1990s I was attending junior college in Bottineau, and enjoyed many trips to other parts of the state to visit friends and relatives. It was a great time to explore different corners of the state around Bismarck, Fargo and Napoleon, but a couple of observations during that time are still vivid today.

One is driving through the town of Minnewaukan, on the west side of Devils Lake, and squinting to see any water to the east, toward Grahams Island State Park. Now, of course, Devils Lake water is creeping into and around Minnewaukan’s city limits.

During the same time frame, but in a different location, I remember seeing a wall of alkali dust blowing off the dry east end of Long Lake near Moffit, whipped across the horizon like billowing smoke from an extensive prairie fire. Today, Long Lake’s 20-mile-long basin is full as well.

As the water returned and expanded, we’ve literally found fish where there used to be pheasants as sloughs, lakes and reservoirs conquered upland and pike replaced roosters.

When it comes to fish movement, the North Dakota Game and Fish Department would prefer the natural expansion and not illegal introductions from random anglers acting as a sort of arm-chair fisheries biologists.

While fish have been introduced or stocked into many North Dakota waters for more than a century, there is a big difference between strategically planned introductions and illegal fish transfer for recreational fishing.

North Dakota has a number of success stories regarding introductions of new fish species into new water bodies. Rainbow smelt into the Missouri River System, large and smallmouth bass into numerous lakes and reservoirs, and trout into many smaller impoundments are examples of past successful efforts.

As you can imagine, these introductions were planned and well researched, matching fish species with available habitat. Success was predicated on the fact that approximately one-half of the state’s water bodies managed for fishing are reservoirs, and nearly all fishable waters in North Dakota have been altered by humans in one form or another.

Random and illegal introduction of fish into new waters can often cause irreparable harm.

As a result, the Department spent a lot of money and time, especially in the 1990s, killing undesirable fish – and along with those the desirable ones as well – in a number of waters in an effort to remove white suckers, bullheads, stunted perch or other detrimental fish and start over.

Recently the state has put more regulations into place relating to fish movement and transport. The most recent of these made it illegal to transport any fish – other than legal bait fish – in water away from a water body for recreational fishing.

Winter and summer, the primary purpose of this rule is to help reduce the potential spread of aquatic nuisance species.

However, this regulation also serves to reduce the temptation for those few misguided anglers who think it’s a good idea to transport and intentionally or unintentionally stock fish into new waters.

High water in rivers and lakes across North Dakota has produced extensive and unprecedented damage to property, homes and disrupted lives.

On the other hand, sloughs that for years seemed nothing more than another dot on the prairie now harbor healthy pike or perch fisheries, and provide many new places for winter anglers to enjoy the fruits that nature has provided.

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Each year without even having to review, I can count on a few standard column topics finding their way onto my screen, like spring fishing, deer season questions and answers, and the pheasant outlook.

At the end of the year I take a look back at the previous seasons and often look ahead at what the coming year’s outdoors scene could look like.

And this time of year, I always make room for a “thankful” column. While this year’s floods across the Midwest created hardships and changed lives among friends, family and co-workers, there’s no reason not to take the glass and fill it up halfway.

Floods that included the Red , Missouri and almost every other river and creek in the state, plus a continually rising Devils Lake, destroyed homes and paths permanently washed out or roads, but we also saw first-hand the true sense of what it means to be neighbors, and not just in a physical address or the genetics of family. In short everyone pitched in and did what they could with the skills, ability and resources available.

We were long on help and short on excuses and no doubt if and when the time comes again, nary a soul will shrug their shoulders. And who can’t be thankful for that?

In terms of fishing, total license numbers aren’t available for some time, but with the Missouri River and lakes Sakakawea and Oahe under siege, there was more discussion on acre feet and cubic feet per second than on limits or whoppers. However, anglers still sought under-the-radar fishing holes, sloughs, rivers and streams for a sort of mental healing and outdoor refuge.

The common theme across the state, with expanding pike populations just about everywhere, has been to find new spots to cast. And in new sports or old, the State Game and Fish Department and communities and organizations worked tirelessly to provide access for anglers and boaters.

We all know that three difficult winters in a row, and a loss of Conservation Reserve Program acres, are factors in lower pheasant and deer populations, but I’m thankful for a nice dry fall that  provided many comfortable days in the field for hunters.

And even with the mild fall hunting season, I’ve had a lot of waterfowl hunters tell me about their great year.

We may see lower pheasant and deer harvests this year, and many hunters have had to work a bit harder than in past years to find success, but that’s hunting, and peaks and valleys in wildlife populations are long-term expectations. I’m thankful things are on the high side for waterfowl and fish to balance things out.

After three difficult winters, I’m thankful that at least through November we haven’t had any widespread major snow events. While most forecasters are predicting a winter trending more toward harsh than mild, the longer the snow holds off, the better it is for our resident wildlife.

I’m also thankful that with ice fishing coming along shortly, upland game, bow, and waterfowl seasons can also provide continuing opportunities through the end of the year. Even as the seasons change from fall hunting to winter, it’s a good time to live in North Dakota.

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