I have been watching the news, every one is concerned about the cattle in Colorado and New Mexico, but I have not heard anything about the deer and Antelope. I doubt there will be any Antelope left in that area and the deer are in trouble too, the whole fawn crop will die. I suspect tags will be hard to get for this fall.

ELKMAN2, I wouldn't worry about it too much. I grew up on a ranch about 80 miles east of Colorado Springs in Lincoln County weatherd some pretty bad storms out there too. It is a little early yet, if we get some late spring storms then the deer and pronghorn might be in a little trouble.

I expect the game animals are doing just fine, the seem to have a tendancy for surviving storms. Dad still ranches out there and hasn't talked of seeing any dead game animals or cattle for that matter. The last few years of drought have been harder on the deer than anything.

The pronghorn keep multiplying. I don't think the DOW is issuing enough pronghorn tags to properly control the population as it is. Two summers ago I can't remeber seeing a doe with just one fawn, we have definatly had some bumper crops.

Well, speaking from "Ground Zero", directly in the center of where the snow bomb went off, it ain't real pretty here.

I've lived on these prairies over half a century and I've seen nothing quite like this before. We received somewhere between 30 and 40 inches of snow--although how you would measure it I have no clue--my wind gauge exceeded 40 mph. (The photos are from my farm shop and the railway here in the local hamlet.)

Initially, I was very pessimistic over the survival probabilities of the area wildlife. However, today I made a short run down the local highway to conduct a bit of storm delayed business. In a 20 mile stretch, I was encouraged by the sight of two large herds of antelope, each consisting of at least 75 individuals. I also saw a dozen mule deer, including 2 very large bucks. Pheasants were numerous along the highway and I did encounter one large covey of scaled quail---and too many cottontails & jackrabbits to count. I counted 8 coyotes.

The problem with this storm is not how many animals survived the initial "blast", but rather how many can make it through the winter. Normally our blizzards come in October or March and the snow has a chance to melt--- either before the colder months arrive or coming into the spring. That obviously is not the case right now.

We harvested several mulie bucks in early/mid December. Not a one had any fat reserves. As usual, most of the does had over an inch of thick fat. That is normal but 3 feet of snow on the level is not. This area is about 30% CRP grass, 50% mixed cropland (winter wheat, milo, corn, sunflowers & millet) and 20% native shortgrass prairie. Virtually all of the available nutrition is buried under 24 to 60 inches of snow with little likelihood of adequate melting before March. No grass, no wheat, no row crop residue is within reach of of bird or beast.

My assumption is that the antelope, male and female, will survive relatively well. Their rut is early and they had time to renew their nutritional resources prior to this storm. Not the case with the deer. I think we will lose most, if not all, of the mature bucks to malnutrition. The coyotes with get the yearlings. Most of the the does should make it through the hard times, as will the smaller bucks. Since the only open ground available to the pheasants is along the roadways they are experiencing a high mortality rate from vehicles.

As far as tags for the coming year being hard to come by---who knows. The Colorado DOW & Commisioners are not a bastion of the brightest and best. They haven't made any rational decisions for many years--so why should this change anything? After all, these are the folks who brought us whirling disease and CWD. That organization spins solely on profits and politics and----well, I digress. Those are just my opinions.

Anyway, I'm a bit dubious as to the near future for our wildlife. It hasn't been wiped out but there's a LOT of winter left.



There are a couple of semi's under there somewhere.

Yep, that's a freight train.

Snow wolf & train.

That's an old house under the drifts. You can walk right up onto the roof.

I think cattle and wildlife are two seperate things- The cattle may not fare very well if feed is not flown in and "air dropped" to them but deer, antelope, etc. have been surviving harsh winters in Colorado forever. Just my opinion. Nice photos Plainview. I haven't seen the snow in the southeast part of the state- just talked to some friends snowed-in in Eads and Kit Carson.

DAMN !!!!!



Leaves me nearly speechless !!

quote:

Originally posted by Ray1970:
I think cattle and wildlife are two seperate things- The cattle may not fare very well if feed is not flown in and "air dropped" to them but deer, antelope, etc. have been surviving harsh winters in Colorado forever. Just my opinion. Nice photos Plainview. I haven't seen the snow in the southeast part of the state- just talked to some friends s nowed-in in Eads and Kit Carson.

I agree with you but, for thousands of years antelope never had to contend with fences, they just don't know how to handle them, goats don't carry a fat reserve and need to eat almost every day when the food is under 3ft of snow they are in trouble. If anything has helped is the temp did not drop to minus30 with the wind.. I hope they make it but personally I doube many will survive,

Did some flying today for several friends who are ranchers in the southeast. Found some dead cattle and some live ones too. Hay was taken out by snowmobile. Didn't see any dead wildlife, but did see antelope and some whitetails. Had to scurry back and land before I exceeded the minimums. Planes can't set down as easy as the helicopters the Colo Nat Guard are using.

Well spent the whole weekend helping my parents dig out after the blizzard. I saw plenty of pronghorn and deer. Saw some huge bucks that I hadn't seen before out in dad's fields and they looked just fine. They definatly didn't get as much snow as Plainview and there is plenty of open ground for the wildlife to still graze plus I've seen them at the hay stacks. When you don't have a whole lot of stuff to stop the wind the snow doesn't stop either.

The good thing about SE Colorado is there isn't very many fences that would stop a pronghorn or deer. So I can't imagine them getting piled up some where unable to get across a fence.

Nice story plainview....Haven't been able to make it back to "ground zero" but at least the news isn't entirely bad. Problem at this point is that we are currently building up for another week of snow and rough weather the weekend of the 13th...that can't be good.

You need to keep an air tube running down into the "doggloo" so he can breath.