feeding them appropriate forage and employing veterinarians . 

 We can also enclose by fence and selectively cull animals, 

 essentially simulating domestic livestock operations. These 

 latter options, however, do not appeal to many people. 



Habitat Maintenance, Enhancement, and Development 



As can be surmised from our previous discussions, we 

 believe that maintenance of diversity is important to mule 

 deer. Deer are very effective at taking advantage of 

 situations, areas, etc. that increase their chance of 

 survival. In habitat management, it seems important that we 

 leave them as many options as possible. Earlier in the 

 century, increased diversity could often be provided by 

 various land uses (e.g., timber cutting or agricultural 

 development). As is typical, however, very little of anything 

 is done in moderation. Increasingly, diversity has peaked as 

 we passed from diversity that included some natural 

 monocultures to an increasing proportion of manipulated 

 monocultures. Thus, habitat management by necessity has 

 increasing become "anti development", promoting maintenance of 

 existing habitat rather than additional "development" or 

 "enhancement" . 



Given the lack of a proven beneficial track record by 

 previous "habitat development" projects, we are reluctant to 

 specifically recommend many manipulative developments. Also, 

 increased ecological knowledge gained by this study and others 

 has cast doubt on the necessity, benefits, or cost- 

 effectiveness of many manipulations. Certainly, preserving 

 winter range space by precluding subdivision will provide 

 meaningful long-term benefit, but attempts to increase forage 

 quantity for deer on winter range may not produce measurable 

 benefits . 



Generally, both the stable and variable properties of the 

 environment are difficult to change, especially to benefit 

 species such as mule deer. In some situations, however, we 

 believe our knowledge is sufficient to recommend potential 

 improvements for mule deer habitat. The applications of these 

 suggestions will depend, among other things, upon the 

 importance of and goals for other species in the area. 



In most cases, alteration of topography is uneconomic and 

 impractical. However, in cases where proposed mining 

 activities will move large amounts of overburden, reclamation 

 of the site could be done in ways that might benefit mule 

 deer. Most mining reclamation plans require that the site be 

 restored to its original contour or possibly to even less 

 topographic relief than originally occurred to reduce 

 potential erosion. We proposed that if it is desirable to 

 benefit mule deer, the overburden could be deposited, 



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