Author ORCID Identifier

https://orcid.org/0009-0002-7336-0237

Semester

Spring

Date of Graduation

2024

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Type

MS

College

Davis College of Agriculture, Natural Resources and Design

Department

Wildlife and Fisheries Resources

Committee Chair

Christopher Rota

Committee Member

John Edwards

Committee Member

Christopher Ryan

Abstract

Big game hunting is an important source of revenue and recreation in the United States. Of big game species, white-tailed deer (Odocileus virginianus) are the most heavily pursued. White-tailed deer are a widespread generalist species, capable of existing at high densities. Hunting is often used as the primary method of managing deer populations, particularly in the eastern United States, where there is a lack of large predators. When populations reach high densities, there can be negative effects on the environment and conflicts with humans. Managers must consider both creating adequate hunting opportunities and reducing negative impacts when managing deer populations. Management plans should ideally be based on biological information, and for such a widespread species, having local information is also important. Information on home range can provide insight into the effectiveness of management plans and the potential for disease spread, as well as inform models for estimating density. Estimating density, and tracking changes in density over time, are important for understanding the status of the population, and how it may be impacted by factors such as hunting regulations or disease. To date, there has been little research involving radio-collared deer in West Virginia. In 2020, the West Virginia Division of Natural Resources (WVDNR) initiated a deer research project to gain insight into local population ecology and update management plans. From 2021–2023, GPS collars were deployed on 350 deer in three study areas across West Virginia. In chapter 1, I evaluated factors influencing home range size. I used GPS location data from the deer collars and calculated seasonal home ranges (n = 1,469) for 221 individual deer. I evaluated the effect of different covariates on home range size and found an effect of sex, age, season, study area, density, and oak mast. Adult deer had the largest home ranges in the spring and yearlings had the largest home ranges in rut. Male deer had the smallest home ranges in summer while female deer had the smallest home ranges in parturition and summer. For male deer, home range size increased with age while there was no effect for female deer. Home range size was positively affected by density and negatively affected by mast. In chapter 2, I evaluated the utility of camera traps to estimate deer density. I deployed grids of camera traps from April–September 2022 in areas where deer capture had occurred. I performed spatial capture-recapture analysis using information from the collared deer to generate detection parameters. Camera surveys produced estimates similar to those from distance sampling conducted by the WVDNR in August 2022, but with lower uncertainty. These results suggest that camera surveys can be effective in estimating deer densities in West Virginia. From the baseline model, information on encounter rates and how they decline as distance between home range centroid and camera trap increase can be applied to estimate densities of entirely unmarked populations. Deploying permanent camera grids on wildlife management areas could provide long-term monitoring that can be used to guide management plans in West Virginia in the future.

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