northern ontario hunt camps having hard time deer

I can't speak for Ontario Moose numbers but there are Moose everywhere in New Brunswick. In my one week hunting trip I saw 6 does' ( no doe tag) 7 Moose, 4 cows and three bulls.. One was a big monster of a bull.. stood and stared at it for a good 15 min from 30 feet away. What an awesome thing to see. Lot's of coyote scat, and bear scat. Even saw a little bear cub ramble over a bank.. never saw the mamma bear. But not a single buck.. a few tracks. But Moose signs were everywhere. Working on a land deal so i can be a resident hunter and get my name in for Moose next year. Tons of Moose. The deer population took a beating these last two winters in Atlantic Canada. Toss in a late rut and warmer then normal weather. It will take a few years for them to bounce back.
I don't think i would have even taken any of the does i saw even if i had the tag. Well there was that one old girl..
 
my72jeep said:
bracebridge is central ont northern starts once you cross the French river.
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Dont know how I missed this one. Just because the MNR maps showing WMU's uses those rivers for dividing geographic areas according to conservation laws doesn't mean everything north of those is north. That's still way way down south. Just because something is north of you direction wise, doesn't make it Northern geographically.

North Bay is central Ontario, as is Thunder Bay. If it's along the 49th, it's central Ontario, yet southern Canada.
 
Arclight said:
We had 3 moose hanging around our area. No signs of bears either.
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Was told by the owner of the camp that I go to, that an outfitter starting hunting bear this fall in WMU 61. They cleared out 25 bears for mostly American hunters. Don't know if that is all true or not. But NO sight of bear. We got lucky in one day with 3 deer, the dogs did not pick them up, they happened to come across a couple of our guys at one of the watches. But other than NO deer tracks, No deer poo, no rubs.....nothing.
 
hunting Manitoulin is somewhat akin to setting up a stand in a feedlot. I know a Guy who feeds them all sorts of grains and such. Uses some sort of cannon to drop them.
Whatever!
By the way Nothern Ontarion would be North of Thunder Bay>
 
Robert777 said:
Was told by the owner of the camp that I go to, that an outfitter starting hunting bear this fall in WMU 61. They cleared out 25 bears for mostly American hunters. Don't know if that is all true or not. But NO sight of bear. We got lucky in one day with 3 deer, the dogs did not pick them up, they happened to come across a couple of our guys at one of the watches. But other than NO deer tracks, No deer poo, no rubs.....nothing.
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It was the same for us. No signs of the rut, no scrapes. Not a buck to be seen. Just does and 2 moose cow's with a calf. This by far was the strangest deer hunt I have been on. It was like every buck simply vanished.
 
RRCo. said:
Deer all moved into town?
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exactly! There are 600 deer/vehicle accidents per year in the big bad city (Wpg). Just heard that on the radio the other day. Very few deer sightings around here! It's going to cool off and we are going to get snow this afternoon, tonight and tomorrow. That may change things hopefully. Got a buddy coming from aways away to join us for a 4 day hunt.
 
Yep, it's cold now and the snow is blowing sideways; most of the ground has a light dusting but there are 2-foot drifts in spots. I saw one nice little buck while taking the dog for her early morning walk, and another slightly larger one just jogged down our driveway. Both of them were in "seeking" mode, and moving at a good clip.
 
hoytcanon said:
I missed that post... lol

If people would only look at a map and see how much land mass is North of even Sudbury/Sault St. Marie/North Bay. .. even Timmins... they might reconfigure their concept of "North"... it certainly does not mean the "Vaughan Mills Mall."
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While I dont consider Vaughan Mills to be north, to many Torontonians, anything beyond it certainly is!
 
1963beretta said:
While I dont consider Vaughan Mills to be north, to many Torontonians, anything beyond it certainly is!
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My half brained cousin from Toronto went to Vaughan Mills and did nothing but complain how he hated going to the country and how dumb the people are there! We'll see how he fairs when the zombie apocalypse hits, he couldn't survive a morning without a trip to Starbucks.
 
Northern Ontario for me is Attawapiskat and Polar Bear Provincial Park. The Muskoka's are so far South in the province, and let's not forget overrun by people fro the GTA.
 
I own a camp in WMU 49 with a couple of childhood buddies. We have had it for nearly 20 years and usually get 3 - 4 deer for 6 hunters every year. For two years now we have seen ZERO deer but are hearing and seeing lots of wolves and bears. We have had a doe tag for the last two years too and decided not to fill it, even if we saw a doe.

We have a theory of why the deer numbers are so low and it involves a number of factors which all equate to poor management and severe weather:

1) Cancellation of spring bear hunt and the requirement to have wolf tags - way more predators.
2) Three years ago we were lucky to get a doe tag (20 percent). Two years ago WMU 49 had 600 surplus doe tags (CRAZY) but MNR did not make a mistake. We had 12 doe tags in a camp of 6 guys for the 2013 season and never saw a doe.
3) That same winter of 2013 - 2014 (VERY Severe) the MNR stopped feeding the Deer Yards (Loring, Ckikpa, Shawnaga etc). Thousands of deer made their way to an area their ancestors went to for generations. As I said we had a very severe winter, since there was no feed, the amount of deer exceeded the carrying capacity of the land, we had a massive die off. Ironically States in the N/E US that usually refused winter feeding enacted a state of emergency and began feeding to save their herd. I believe Wisconsin actually gave feed to land owners. Not Ontario.
4) To top it off last winter (2014-2015) was pretty tough too.
5) We too are seeing more moose and turkey but not too sure if they affect the dear populations. We re thinking the deer usually affect moose populations with the spread of brain worm.

If any of our facts are incorrect please feel free to correct us.

I am glad to hear there are pockets of deer still around. With a bit of luck it will take 5 - 10 years but these will be the deer that will build up our herd up again.
 
Just saw a little spike buck dead in the ditch a couple hundred yards from my driveway. That brings the total of legal (antlered) deer that I have seen this season to either 4 or 5, not sure about one possible repeat sighting. Certainly not a staggering number, but a huge improvement over last year and hopefully a sign of better things to come. More does seen, and most this year seem to have had twin fawns, so with the help of El Nino this winter we may see a much better season next year.

Not to derail the thread, but the North vs. South debate reminds me of a couple of Toronto residents I met when I worked downtown (commuting about 120km each way to make it bearable). These folks were proud of the fact that they owned no heavy winter coat, and only light boots, because they were able to get from home to work without ever going outside. They considered a walk through Queen's Park to be an Arctic expedition. I have felt more of a "meeting of minds" when conversing by means of pidgin-English and hand gestures with San Bushmen in Namibia than when I spoke to those new-age urbanites. "North" is a state of mind! :)
 
Muskyhunter1,
Your assessment of the low deer numbers is partly correct. Predation however is not as significant a factor as one might imagine. Natural Predators and prey have adapted for millenia and respond to cycles as poulation number change over time. In fact wildlife populations are more resilient and healthier with predation. Predators usually kill the young in spring, the crippled, diseased and old animals (but you guys shoot em before they get old) and scavenge the winterkill.
A whitetail doe will produce offspring in her second year of life. She may produce 2 fawns per year for 8 years while she is in her prime. If you guys shoot 2 year old does or fawns, you take potentially 7-14 deer from the poulation. Now remember each of those deer she would have mothered has 1 or 2 fawns each year for a time. Now you see that that young doe you shot plus her offspring that she never had a chance to produce actually amount to hundreds of deer over time.
My advice to hunters is stop shooting immature deer when populations are low or just don't hunt that year or two or go hunt in an area with strong numbers if one even exists. We have nobody to blame but ourselves.
The arguement that younger animals taste better may be the case but have any of you actually shot a 4 year old buck? They don't taste nearly as bad as you would expect and you get 4 times the meat as a fawn and 2 times as much as a mature doe. A quick kill plays far more into taste than age.
 
Muskyhunter1 said:
I own a camp in WMU 49 with a couple of childhood buddies. We have had it for nearly 20 years and usually get 3 - 4 deer for 6 hunters every year. For two years now we have seen ZERO deer but are hearing and seeing lots of wolves and bears. We have had a doe tag for the last two years too and decided not to fill it, even if we saw a doe.

We have a theory of why the deer numbers are so low and it involves a number of factors which all equate to poor management and severe weather:

1) Cancellation of spring bear hunt and the requirement to have wolf tags - way more predators.
2) Three years ago we were lucky to get a doe tag (20 percent). Two years ago WMU 49 had 600 surplus doe tags (CRAZY) but MNR did not make a mistake. We had 12 doe tags in a camp of 6 guys for the 2013 season and never saw a doe.
3) That same winter of 2013 - 2014 (VERY Severe) the MNR stopped feeding the Deer Yards (Loring, Ckikpa, Shawnaga etc). Thousands of deer made their way to an area their ancestors went to for generations. As I said we had a very severe winter, since there was no feed, the amount of deer exceeded the carrying capacity of the land, we had a massive die off. Ironically States in the N/E US that usually refused winter feeding enacted a state of emergency and began feeding to save their herd. I believe Wisconsin actually gave feed to land owners. Not Ontario.
4) To top it off last winter (2014-2015) was pretty tough too.
5) We too are seeing more moose and turkey but not too sure if they affect the dear populations. We re thinking the deer usually affect moose populations with the spread of brain worm.

If any of our facts are incorrect please feel free to correct us.

I am glad to hear there are pockets of deer still around. With a bit of luck it will take 5 - 10 years but these will be the deer that will build up our herd up again.
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100% agree with your theory on deer population decline. Being so close to Algonquin as well coyote/wolf tags are going to get harder to get.

I really wish I lived closer to my camp, Start a yarding area of my own. lol
 
umchorn2 said:
Muskyhunter1,
Your assessment of the low deer numbers is partly correct. Predation however is not as significant a factor as one might imagine. Natural Predators and prey have adapted for millenia and respond to cycles as poulation number change over time. In fact wildlife populations are more resilient and healthier with predation. Predators usually kill the young in spring, the crippled, diseased and old animals (but you guys shoot em before they get old) and scavenge the winterkill.
A whitetail doe will produce offspring in her second year of life. She may produce 2 fawns per year for 8 years while she is in her prime. If you guys shoot 2 year old does or fawns, you take potentially 7-14 deer from the poulation. Now remember each of those deer she would have mothered has 1 or 2 fawns each year for a time. Now you see that that young doe you shot plus her offspring that she never had a chance to produce actually amount to hundreds of deer over time.
My advice to hunters is stop shooting immature deer when populations are low or just don't hunt that year or two or go hunt in an area with strong numbers if one even exists. We have nobody to blame but ourselves.
The arguement that younger animals taste better may be the case but have any of you actually shot a 4 year old buck? They don't taste nearly as bad as you would expect and you get 4 times the meat as a fawn and 2 times as much as a mature doe. A quick kill plays far more into taste than age.
Click to expand...

Oh jeez... another armchair biologist... am I in the "Hunting" forum, "YOU GUYS???
 
We have come to the conclusion the turkeys may have something to do with it. We have turkeys everywhere and no one hunts the critters. I see hundreds everytime I go out.
Is the deer heard diseased as a result of the thousands of turkeys?
 
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Yes, turkeys have been shown to impact deer numbers by pecking the testicles off of new-born male fawns. No new breeders to replace the older bucks as they die off, and the population plummets.

What the hell has happened to this thread?
 
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