Deer Count Down

This was on the newswire this morning and posted by WTIP. I thought it was interesting considering how many deer we have been seeing on the Gunflint Trail, mostly at the top of the trail.

Preliminary numbers are in from the first few days of the 2009 firearms deer hunting season in the Arrowhead. Those numbers show the harvest is down substantially across the northeast, according to the Department of Natural Resources.

Overall across the northern part of the state, the harvest is down 16 percent compared to last fall. The 2008 totals were also down from 2007. Tough winters and increased predation have been sited as reasons for lower numbers over the past three years.

The harvest in the Northwestern part of the state is down as much as 36 percent at International Falls. Closer to home, the harvest is down 2 percent in the Duluth–Cloquet area. According to the official registration station at Buck’s Hardware in Grand Marais, over 200 deer have been registered as of Wednesday, which is the same or fewer than last year.

From Saturday through Monday of this week, the DNR reports 23,468 deer had been registered – down by 4,392 for the same period last year. Warm weather and the lack of snow for tracking have made the start of this year’s hunt even slower than usual.