N Colorado Mule Deer and Giant Snowstorm

[cnelk]

Based on the snow forecast for this weekend, N Colorado mountains are looking to get 3-6 FEET of snow by Monday.

The deer I have been seeing at the projected storm elevation are gonna take a big hit.

Anyone that has applied or thinking of applying for a deer tag in Larimer County might want to monitor this.

Good Luck

 

[ColoradoV]

It’s later in the year and I don’t see this storm is anything like the say the 2016 and 2018 winters in the Gunnison valley that basically eliminated a entire age class of bucks and fawns. We are seeing the effects of those winters now in far fewer mature bucks.

Big healthy bucks seem to make the one off storms so the effect would not be that bad this year but maybe if the storm even pans out 3-4 years down the road.

 

[cnelk]

^^^ Maybe so, but the Gunny valley deer herd wasnt annihilated by the CPW several years ago for CWD.

The deer herd in N Colorado has just started to recover from that fiasco

 

[ColoradoV]

Cpw is annihilating the deer everywhere... Not just a northern thing man.

The difference in the gunny storms was both years they were in early January and followed by a month of temps in the negative.. They totally buried the sage and left nothing to eat for 2-3 months... Very few small bucks or fawns even survived the winter. This storm is in mid March temps will be in the 50’s over the forecast area in a week.

Again I don’t see it killing off many of the big bucks for this year.

 

[cnelk]

^^^ Well, there you have it folks. All will be good

 

[Coveyleader]

Big difference between front range storms and western slope storms and impacts it has on animals.

 

[PathFinder]

This storm won't do much to them. They've basically been on dry ground all winter long, and this will be melted on the south slopes by next weekend.

Sent from my SM-G973U using Tapatalk

 

[Jimss]

I've had game cams set up in Larimer County all winter long. The deer have had a pretty easy time up until this past big snow. It was sunny today and it is supposed to be in the 50's later this week so I think the deer will do fine. Obviously deer that remain up higher elevation may not be able to move around much if the snow is 3' deep but my guess is most of the deer haven't used a whole lot of their winter fat reserves and are doing fine.

As mentioned, there is night and day difference between the Gunnison Basin and the Front Range during the winter. Deer are pretty much trapped in the Gunn Valley with no where to wander when snow gets deep and it get's cold. Gunnison generally has some of the coldest temps in Colo all winter long and deep snow can often last the entire winter.