Chapter II - Background 



How Much Private Land 

 is Open to Public 

 Hunting? 



Using available information created by the department we compared 

 the number of acres in block management to the number of privately 

 owned acres open to public hunting. Information was only available 

 for mule deer hunting. In 1995 the department issued a report on 

 Montana deer and deer hunting. In that report FWP wildlife 

 biologists estimated the amount of private land per hunting district, 

 and how much of that was open, leased, or restricted for mule deer 

 hunting. We compared numbers in that report to the number of 

 acres in block management in 1995 and 1998 for mule deer hunting. 

 The following table shows the results. There are approximately 94 

 million acres of land in Montana. 



Table 4 

 Private Land Open for Mule Deer Hunting in MT 



Source: 



Compiled by the Legislative Audit Division from department records. 



As illustrated by the above table, for mule deer hunting about 24 

 percent of the private land open to public hunting is enrolled in 

 block management. 



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