215 



more open south-facincr slopes, rather than a true picture of deer 

 use. During fall roughly equal proportion of deer were found 

 on all exposures exceot southwest exposures, which may have been 

 too dry in this period. During winter a large proportion of deer 

 were on northeast exposures, .just the opposite of what seems 

 logical. The mild winter and lack of snow cover certainly 

 allowed mule deer more freedom of choice of areas to feed in. 

 Snring and summer 198I observations were scattered over all 

 exposures, with no clear preferences. 



Use of slope: The majority of mule deer observed were on medium 

 slopes (Table 119). Numbers of deer on gentle slopes was highest 

 in summer and fall and lowest in spring and winter. The proportion 

 of deer on steep slopes was highest in spring and summer of I98I, 

 and much lower in winter than on the Birney study area. 



Whitetail Deer 



Eighty-one whitetail deer were observed on the Kirby study area. 

 Average group size was highest in spring and lowest in summer 

 (Table 120). Fall observations were too few to obtain production 

 data. 



Distribution; Figure 98 shows the distribution of whitetail deer 

 during the entire study. All of the observations were on or near 

 the Tongue River. 



Use of vegetation : The vegetation data were lumped into four main 

 vegetatlonal types because of the small number of observations 

 (Table 120). Most of the spring observations were in the ponderosa 

 pine and Juniper series (mostly Juniper-sage) and the grassland 

 series (all in sagebrush). Deer were observed in all four types 

 during summer, but mainly in the riparian type. All of the obser- 

 vations in fall were in riparian types. Only one group was sighted 

 during winter, in Juniper-sage habitat. Undoubtedly many deer in 

 deciduous tree and shrub riparian types were missed due to poor 

 observability in these types. 



Use of topography, slope, exposure : Nearly all of the whitetail deer 

 were on flat or gentle slooes near the river where exposure is 

 not imoortant. They often used alluvium/terraces near the river, 

 but rarely used more rugged uplands. 



Antelope 



Four hundred and seven antelope were observed on the Kirby study area. 

 Average group size ranged from 2.6 in summer to 29.5 in winter 

 (Table 121). Dispersal from the large winter herds into small 

 groups occurred in March and April. Antelope were most easily 

 observed in December, when 23.6 antelope were observed per hour of 

 aerial survey (Table 113). Fawn production appeared to be low in 

 both years (Table 122), but this may be an artifact of the small 

 sample sizes classified. 



