EP 349: The State of Nevada Big Game 2025 with NDOW

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Hey everybody, Jason Carter, Adam Bronson, Devin Archibald. Of course, we got Logan here. He's at the keyboard, making sure everything sounds good. Appreciate it, Logan. How you doing? I'm doing good. Good. How about you, Devin? You doing good? Doing good. You getting any sleep, Devin? A little bit. Yeah. Devin's got a new little baby, and of course, being the best dad in the whole wide world. Have you got that trophy yet? When does that come? Probably premature to call that. I don't know. Adam and I are pretty impressed. I feel like I deserve it. We're calling you deserve it. I appreciate it. You deserve it. I mean, you've had it, what? You've had it. 22 days. Defecate all over you.

That's part of being a good dad. Right? Yeah. Trying to get to work and cleaning yourself up. Yeah. Good. It's just, anyway, being a good, productive, awesome dad. Thanks. Anyway, hopefully, are you taking sleeping pills to like have three minutes? I know you wouldn't see me. I'd be a no call, no show or whatever. No call, no show. All right. Well, anyway, Bronson, how are you doing? Excellent. We're doing awesome. This is like spring. I thought you were going to wear shorts today. I was a little disappointed. Well, I just warned everybody. You know, we're transitioning to that phase of weather. And I just warned everybody. Somebody's going to break the ice. It could be me. Just don't let it jar you. I saw you in shorts the other day, Devin. Me? At your house. Oh, yeah, that was in my house. Yard work's different. You were chilling out. Lounging. Well, our yard work's different.

Anyway, it's good weather. And here we are approaching May, basically. And coming to the end of the application season, we've got a few states left that we're excited about. We're cranking extremely hard at the end of April here. Also got one publication that we're working on. You know, we've got Idaho and California be coming out here, the June issue. EMAC will be on within a week. So this week, probably by the end of the week. Pretty fun. Bronson and I are cranking that out. So here we go. It's kind of fun. A lot of results coming out here, too, shortly. Of course, we've had some results already. We're excited for everybody and helping everybody obtain hunts and tags and get basic plans in line for this year, 2025. Can't believe it. 2025. Today's kind of a special day. We've got some guests coming on. We've got Sean Espinosa, Scott Roberts, and Joe Bennett of Nevada. Endow.

Super good dudes. Just want to kind of go over Nevada with them and crank through some things, look at some new quotas and kind of the state of the nation address for the state of Nevada. State of the silver state. Yeah, the silver state. So anyway, I'm a gold state. I kind of like gold. We've got silver, copper. Yeah, we did copper last week. This is silver. What's the gold state? Alaska? What do we got? Does anybody claim that? That would be more fitting. It would be. California may be. It would be fitting. We're the honeybee state or something. Can't be California. Aren't we? Well, elks are state animal. State animal. Wapati. It is? Yeah. Seagull's the state bird, doesn't it? Saga lily's the state flower. Yeah, seagulls. Well, that reminds me. It's hard to turn that into gold. Speaking of defecating and everything, I had a seagull come. Oh, I was a little kid.

I was a little kid, and I'm going down there in Disneyland or whatever, and it just whacked me out. California? Oh, it's no joke. Three pounds, maybe.

It was wild. All right. Well, enough of the light stuff. Logan, let's get these guys on and talk about Nevada a bit and work them over a little bit about their state and the good things that are happening there.

Three pounds.

It was crazy. I'm just here to tell you. It was a traumatic event when you were a little kid, huh? It happened to my sister, too, and that was great when that happened.

All for the games. Anyway.

There we go. You guys hear us okay?

Okay. Turn them up a little bit, Logan, if you've got the ability to do that. All right. Have we got Sean there?

Hey, guys. Hey. There you are. Is this Sean? Sean Espinosa? Yeah. All right. Yeah, we've got you. We've got you loud and clear. Joe, you on? I think I can see you. Oh, I like it. Yeah. Welcome. And then what have we got? We've got Scott Roberts as well. Can you hear us okay?

There you go. Perfect. All right. Well, we appreciate you guys coming on and visiting about Nevada with us. It's one of a state that we're, you know, exceptionally familiar with, but we also love Nevada for a number of reasons. Yeah, fond is the right word. That's what I was looking for, Bronson. Anyway, pretty fun. You guys got a lot going on there. I love it. I was out there this last weekend. One of my favorite things, just to kind of break the ice here, but one of my favorite things is when you're out there, you're by yourself, even though you're not by yourself. You're by yourself. You know what I mean? Which can be a bad thing, too, if you have truck problems. Yeah, it can be, but, you know, if you keep up on your tires, right, Devin? Yeah. You've had a few tire issues out there. Yeah, it happens.

But if you keep up on things and your maintenance and drive something half decent, well, it feels pretty good out there. So, anyway, love Nevada for a lot of reasons. We're going to get into that. Maybe as we get started, I don't know, we could start with Sean, Scott, or Joe, whatever, and just kind of introduce yourselves, maybe a little bit of your history with Endow and what your title is and what you oversee there at Endow. Let's start with Sean, maybe.

Sean Espinosa. Sure. Thanks, Jason. My name is Sean Espinosa. I'm the game division administrator for the department. This is my 29th year with the department.

Previous to that, I was the Oakland game staff specialist for 20 years. So, spent a lot of time working on sage-grouse conservation issues in particular, and then a whole host of other Oakland game species, which are pretty popular here in the state of Nevada, like chucker and Hungarian partridge. And then prior to that, I had some habitat positions, and then I actually started my career in law enforcement down south back in 1996. I was a warden down there for four years. Oh, okay. And in Boulder City south, the searchlight. Oh, wow. There's a desolate stretch of highway. There's nothing to poach down there. A couple desert sheep. Road runner, maybe. I don't know. Probably a lot more in that country than a guy would think. Yeah. Actually, on one particular day, I did see three of the biggest mule deer I ever saw in my life crossing El Dorado Valley, which. Jeez. Good thought. No kidding.

Back in the 90s, Jason. They have basal points and eye guards. How was he built? Yeah, how was he built? Typical genetic. That was before it was built up with solar panels and transmission lines and all that kind of stuff. Yeah. That has changed some of the country. It's hard to even fathom. You know, I've spent a lot of time in that, but I can't even really fathom that now. Yeah. I mean. Yeah. There's a lot going on down there now. That's almost 30 years ago. Yeah. Crazy. Yeah. You were down in the middle of nowhere. And, of course, back then, it just seems like, and maybe you can correct me, some of the division trucks, the endow trucks, would have 150 plus thousand hard miles. And a guy like you is out there in the middle of nowhere. 120 or 30 degrees. Yeah. Yeah.

And, well, we had just transitioned from the old Dodge Ram, which is one of the roughest riding paths I've ever been in my entire life. And usually the caravan camper, after about 100,000 miles, would just about rattle off and be cracked in about 15 different places on the bed of the pickup. Yeah. There you go. Yeah. That's wild. Yeah. You probably had some fused vertebraes from that.

Jeez. Well, good. That's awesome. And so, spent a lot of time doing a lot of different things. And then what are, did you say it already? Maybe you did. But what are you currently doing? Game division? It's the administrator for the game division. And what does that guy do? What do you do? Well, I'd like to do a lot less. But, so, we have small game program. Of course, our big game program. Our aerial operations division. Wildlife health. Fur bearer management. And migratory game birds. So, a lot of that's kind of coordinating with different aspects between all of those different realms within our division.

And setting up our federal aid grants on an annual basis. Making sure that our budgets are adequate to fulfill our needs across future fiscal years. And a whole host of other issues that we could spend an inordinate amount of time talking about. So, not the fun stuff. All right. Well, let's talk about fun stuff. Yeah. Let's talk about fun stuff. Yeah. But you've got to do it. That has to be done. That's behind the scenes. Yes. Heavy lifting stuff. Heavy lifting stuff. The fun stuff doesn't happen if that doesn't happen. That's right. So, all right. So, let's see. Scott, do you want to introduce yourself?

Yeah, sure. This is Scott Roberts. I'm the Eastern Region Game Supervisor based at Elko. So, supervising the biologists from areas 6 through 15 for the most part. And I started with the department in 2004 as a fishery seasonal. Then moved through the guzzler program, comp tag program. Was the area 12 area biologist. Moved into the area 10. Biologist position for a number of years. And then last summer took the leap into the supervisor position. Awesome. You've seen a lot. You've seen a lot. And, of course, you're up there in the high deer densities. Probably saw Devin's truck. A little bit. Yeah, Devin. Devin, you've got to watch this guy. We put a tracker on him. I love that country. But, yeah. Devin loves that country. And then you've just got a lot of your, you know, high deer densities.

And, of course, a lot of, there's a lot of emotion up there with, you know, tag increases, decreases. You know, it affects a lot of people, obviously. And the quality versus quantity. We'll get into all of that. But it's a lot of fun. A wild country. And actually a lot of game. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, and just crazy variety also. You know, the bios in the region have desert bighorns, Rocky Mountain bighorns, California bighorns, all the state's mountain goats. Moose. Biggest deer herds. Biggest elk herds. It's pretty awesome. Biggest antelope herds these days. Yeah. Great quality of all. That's a place everybody should be applying, huh, Devin? Himalayan snow talks. Don't even go there. I don't know what to say. Devin, he tries to sandbag that country a little bit. Tells us all in the office how terrible it is. And then pretty soon. I'm up there all the time.

He's up there by himself all the time. He just wants us to know that it's like 2,000 miles to drive up there. That's what he wants. Yeah. And he needs the entire. Yeah. He buys every tire plug Walmart sells all the way up there. So, anyway. Good stuff. Yeah, we'll dive into that. Of course, we've got the new quotas here handy. You guys got a commission meeting coming up, and that'll be fun. It's always interesting, and we like it. We like to watch all that and stay in tune with that stuff. And so, anyway, we appreciate you coming on. Joe, I know you a little bit better just because we've dealt with each other over the years, and you're down here a little bit closer to me in some of this desert stuff. But why don't you introduce yourself a little bit? Yeah. Good afternoon. Good afternoon, everyone. Thanks for having us. Joe Benham. I'm the new Predator Staff Specialist.

I've been with the department about 10 years. I started as a Tonopah game biologist for about five years, then was a Southern Region game supervisor, and then just transitioned into this new role a couple months ago. So, now that Scott's done showing off, talking about variety and densities and everything, we can maybe tell the two sides of the state as we go through this storyline here, since we haven't got much moisture or anything. They're actually hauling water as we speak, unfortunately, in the Meadow Valleys. So, I'm sure we'll delve into that here in a little bit. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Joe's seen a lot. Of course, he's in some of that desert stuff that's very arid, or knows a lot about it, and dealing with mule deer, which is, you know, I'm hitting him up, asking him about mule deer and a few things that I really care about.

And, yeah, you're dealing with a lot of not-so-fun things as far as desert sheep and watching the ebbs and flows there and dealing with some of that. So, challenging at best. Well, where should we start off? We'd like, I guess we just want to stay to the nation. Yeah, we've got some broader stuff and then maybe some regional stuff that you guys want to highlight. I'm sure you have some things you want to talk about. Of course, the application period's open right now for Nevada. That's on a lot of people's minds. We feel a lot of calls every day about Nevada right now with, of course, the deadline on May 7th coming up. So, yeah, I don't know who wants to grab the mic first between you, whether we start big and focus in or whether you want to focus in on a region or whatever. We'll let you guys, one of you, take off, and we'll steer it somehow.

Well, maybe I'll just start off from a statewide perspective and kind of give a broad overview, and then you guys can ask more specific questions.

I've kind of highlighted a few bullets from what we're recommending anyway and kind of where some of our big game ungulate populations are at. But I guess, you know, first and foremost is that there's quite a few of our populations that are actually increasing, and there's some good news there. You know, after the winter of 2022 and a winter before that in 2018, our mule deer herd was looking pretty bleak overall, some pretty low population estimates. But we've seen a level of recovery at this point. We've had two good years in a row of fawn recruitment. And during that period, we're also seeing an elevated buck ratio on the landscape overall. And those two things together for many of our larger units are kind of leading to elevated tag quota numbers. We had recommendations last year that weren't too different. We're recommending about 20% more deer tags this year than we did last year.

Last year, our commission cut those tag numbers and approved a number that was quite a bit less than we recommended. So if you just look at it from a approved standpoint last year to a recommended standpoint this year, it's a difference of about 49%. So it's quite a bit more deer tags. But like I mentioned, we have a pretty high buck ratio. Our postseason buck ratio across the state was 34 bucks for 100 does. So it's pretty high for a postseason ratio. And then we've got several units that are well in excess of that figure. So that's leading to some of the kill rate increases that I'm sure you guys have already looked at. Yeah, we have looked at them. Just to stop you for a quick sec, like do you know off the top of your head what those ratios look like roughly? And in what regions or areas that you're looking at that? I didn't go through region by region.

By unit, you certainly have those figures. Yeah, like I'm showing increases in like Area 13, for example. But, you know, that one had like a 90% cut, you know, and it's very susceptible to drought and things like that. And so we noticed that. And then obviously you guys are showing you had great surveys. I mean, you've got great counts. And so you're, you know, recommending quite a bit of an increase percentage wise. Not overall numbers. Not going to make a huge difference on the bottom line statewide. But for the area, you can tell that that's definitely on your radar is having an uptick. Yep. Yep. And I can let Scott speak to Area 13, but I think our buck ratio in Area 13 was like 39 bucks per 100 does. Post-season. And so that's the one thing Adam and I, and of course Devin, we're all very fond, again, of Nevada.

But managing for high buck to doe ratios, which is maybe it's not even really that high, but we feel like it's awesome considering what we're dealing with over here being 30 to 35 bucks per 100 does, generally speaking, depending on the units that you guys are talking about. And so we're appreciative of that. When you go to Nevada, you have a special experience because of that. You're going to see good numbers of bucks in comparison to the hunters on the landscape. And so managing that way, you, the commission, politics, everything involved makes it to where you're managing fairly tight considering the resource that you have. Wouldn't you say, Adam, kind of what your take is? Well, yeah. I mean, just to draw a parallel with Utah, you know, most of our units we manage for 15 to 20. You know, 15 to 17 or 18 to 20 on general season.

And we do have some premium limited entry and limited entries that they manage for 25 to 30 and 30 to 40, whatever it is. But in Nevada, they average the majority of those. I mean, I know they probably have different breakdowns, like some of the alternative management units and things like that at 35. But the others, I think, are like 25 or 30 plus or whatever. Is that right, Sean? Yeah, I guess just to back up a bit, we do have our standard units, alternative units and non-standard units. The alternative units are kind of the more trophy units, if you will, like Area 13. The standard units we manage for between 25 to 35 bucks for 100 does and kind of trying to get to that middle objective of 30 bucks for 100 does postseason. The alternative units were, you know, right around 35 with, you know, a better harvest success rate, better percentage of four point or better.

And the non-standard units, they don't get surveyed. But we look at those harvest metrics. We look at overall four point or better quality and try and manage for 45% under success or better generally. And so most of those units, we try and reflect that as best we can. Some of them achieve that or better. And we even have some standard units at this point in time that are treated more like alternative units. 0.5.1, for example, in the north central part of the state, I think we have a postseason buck ratio of 46. And we have outstanding metrics in terms of success and four point or better. So, you know, it's getting to the point now where we might have to modify our hunt guidance and ask the commission if there's alternative strategies that they'd like to see employed. Otherwise, we're not going to be able to sustain some of the buck ratios that were our initial harvest objectives.

So you're just saying, I mean, in layman's terms, we're talking about loading tags into some of these places, potentially if you're going to really manage that because you're dealing with a great, you know, a great set of numbers postseason. You're just dealing with, you're obviously, yeah, it's a good problem. It's a good problem to have, but it can be socially awkward at times. Yeah. You guys have, you got to deal with that. That's right. Your job is to bring forward the numbers and then the commission gets to balance those numbers off of science and then dealing with the politics on it and what the little hunters want. Yeah, and so anyway, that's fun. It's nice that we can smile about it, right? A few years ago, we weren't so happy. Right now, you're saying, hey, here's the numbers. I'm going to go out and give you that data and then what you all decide is what you decide.

Of course, you guys are passionate about your numbers and you're not out there wanting to just be out there and your numbers not mean anything. And sometimes it does fall on deaf ears when people, you know, when we don't want high numbers, we want high quality, you know. And so there's that fine balance, but it is fun to watch the recovery. It's fun to watch the numbers increase. Fun to have good weather patterns that are conducive to that. And we're seeing that down here in the southern part of the state too. I'm sure Joe can, we'll chime in on some of his stuff in a minute, but maybe now that we've high graded your conversation a little bit, we could talk about these same numbers deer-wise because we, and we stopped you on deer because we're so excited about them. But maybe what, Scott, you're seeing on Area 6, 7, some of these others,

there's obvious a trend upwards in tag recommendations. But where did those tag recommendations come from? What did you really see on the landscape? What did the hunters report and the overall outlook for that? Yeah, so regionally, you know, really echoing what the conversation's been about. We're regionally running a buck ratio of 34 observed postseason last year. We had our highest recruitment rate since 1998. Last year's recruitment was fantastic. So we've had the best two years in a row since 98, 99.

You know, we definitely got hit a lot harder in 18, 19 and 22, 23 than most of the state. We lost thousands of deer and we lost, you know, thousands of tags worth of opportunity to, you know, you spoke to Area 13 showing a high percentage, but that's coming off historically low quotas, you know, across the board last year. That's right. And, you know, it looks percentage wise like a huge increase, but we're also in Area 13 going for a postseason buck ratio of 45 with those quotas. And so we understand the sensitivity. We understand, you know, that it is front loaded with a lot of young bucks, but we're just starting to chip away at some of those incredible buck ratios that we do have regionally. And so through those bigger units that you spoke to, six, seven, and 10, we're seeing some pretty sizable increases.

But again, historically low quotas, we're not even getting back up to average quotas with these jumps. And so we're chipping away, looking at anywhere from 32 to 40 as a postseason ratio moving into next year. And so, yeah, it's a good problem to have, like we said, but it's just a catastrophic event. And then really good news afterwards. It's hard to balance those two. People are very sensitive to the thousands of deer lost and the heavy winters and the effects of that. We've seen that in other states too, you know, Wyoming and Colorado at times in the past. And when they see it be brought to its knees so cripplingly fast, they're maybe just reluctant to see it, give it up, give any growth back up. And that's probably human nature. It's kind of like hoarding your goods.

You want to make sure you've got enough to last the next one, even though the next one might not be for eight or 10 years. And they're trying to say, hey, well, we've got them now. We can start taking some, get the opportunity back up, let some hunters hunt. Yeah, let some hunters hunt. Yeah. There is, there's some validity to all of that. And, and two, luckily for you guys, I don't think you see a winter loss that often. I mean, it's, it's Nevada, you know, although you guys are in a little unique spot up there, dealing with, you know, there's been winter range loss and habitat and things like that. And then when you do have a rough winter, it's just hard overall. But maybe you can speak to that a little bit. And then also maybe speak to the quality that you're seeing. It's one thing to have this ratio.

But does that made up primarily of these young bucks that have been recruited in, you know, where do you feel like the quality sits in comparison to what it has done, maybe in an average or, or at a high or whatever? Or, I mean, if you feel like by raising the quotas, we're looking at taking out some, you know, two and a half, three and a half year olds, or, or do you feel like you're actually seeing, starting to see some real quality on the landscape? Maybe speak to that a little bit. I would say both are accurate. You know, harvest is always focused on young bucks just across the board, you know, outside of exceptional circumstances with, you know, the Henrys or Area 24, something along those lines. But in general, harvest is always on those yearlings, two-year-old, three-year-old bucks. And so we're definitely seeing that.

That's definitely, you know, the higher percentage of bucks on the landscape. There were a surprising number of nice bucks taken last year, and it should only get better. You know, getting further away. But like I said, 22, 23 definitely took out a lot of older age class bucks, took out a lot of young, you know, took out most of the fawns. And that's coming right on the heels of 18, 19, which was terrible around here. We had, you know, fawn loss, 50, 60, 70 percent, and adult doe loss in the 20 to 40 percent. And so there's been some major events, and they've just really been stacked right on top of each other. Because 15, 16 and 16, 17, if we hadn't had these two, we'd still be talking about those two winters also. Heavy snow loads. We had major flooding in Elko one of those years. And then the other year we were sub-zero for six weeks straight.

And so there's just been a lot crammed into the last 10 years, which is definitely abnormal to have so many events in such a short time frame. Like I said, we've definitely responded with tags in those times. Hopefully we hit the bottom last year. And we're, I mean, we're seeing meaningful growth in these herds. And hopefully we'll start chipping away with, you know, some of those tag increases while not sacrificing everything in the future.

And I think by going to postseason objectives of 40, 37, you know, depending on which unit you're in, I don't think we're going to lose that quality. I don't think we're mortgaging the future by starting to chip away now and allowing some people to get out in the field. Okay. That makes sense. And I think most people may be a little surprised at what they're hearing about some of these big winters in Nevada because it is the driest state in the nation. Most people think of Nevada as a desert. But from north to south, it's completely different. I mean, and you're good. It's like northern California versus southern California. They're that different. Exactly. Yeah. And so that northern part, you know, call it, you know, from unit 10 north or, you know, and definitely everything north of I-70, it just definitely gets a different weather pattern.

And that cold, like a northern Utah, southern Idaho cold, those, you know, Wyoming winters and two that hit that. And a lot of people maybe listening to this don't understand that they have a real long, cold, prolonged winter period up there with deep snow at times. And then down south, you got places that guzzlers are dry and they're hauling water. The same year. All at the same time trying to keep deer alive, sheep alive. And it's a complete 180 degree difference. They've lost sheep populations and deer population due to drought and lack of water. And there's been peaks and valleys. But, I mean, dealing in an area so vastly different. So I think that's, you know, maybe as you transition to Joe and where he's hung out, that's, you know, he's like, hey, I challenge a winner. I challenge a winner to kill one of my deer in the southern Nevada.

And I would add up there, it's the winters and then it's the fires, too. Some of that winter range got torched. Sage brown. And, you know, it's just, yeah, it's kind of a double whammy there. So, Scott, before we, I'm kind of feeling the direction we should go with this. I don't know. I'm just seeing what you guys think. What do you mean, deer wise? No, let's just stay on deer for the entire podcast. No, I think let's flesh out some of the other, let Scott flesh that out a little bit more on some of the other stuff that he's seeing. And hearing in area 12 and 16 and 14 and 15 or any of those surrounding areas. And then let's transition to Joe, talk about that. Joe's over predators, but, I mean, he's passionate about the big game and has dealt with that extensively. Just barely left that. Barely left that role, yeah. And so deal with that.

And then let's visit with Sean about some other things and then let Sean take us to the next species and talk about antelope. I'd like to really dive into that. Really? Well, they come back quick. Two and three-year-olds, they're impressive. And so flesh that out a little bit and then, of course, we'll keep going down the chain. And so does that sound good with you guys, Scott? Can we keep going for a minute? I know 06.5 back in the day, I'm just talking way back in the day, was under alternative management. Still is. But it had challenges with fire and things like that. And just maybe speak to that and then surrounding areas. And what are you seeing? Area 10, there's been, and I'd hate to talk Boone and Crockett, and I know you guys do too, but like 250 buck in the late archery and things like that. Like I know what the potential is there. Maybe just speak to that.

The quality you're seeing, because we as hunters get excited, we all smile when there's something special on the landscape or you're seeing an overall age increase, which is a quality increase. But maybe just speak to that and the enthusiasm that we're all feeling. We're all feeling a little bit of enthusiasm for where Nevada's headed. And I want to keep down that path of what you're seeing on the positive side. And you can talk negative if there is any. I just feel like everything feels slightly positive and maybe flesh out some of the other units that you're right in the middle of.

Okay, there was a lot there. So remind me. So let's talk any other, like we did with 06s and 07s. Give us the rundown on what you're seeing in the other areas as well that you're affiliated with. So breaking them up 11, 12, 13. Yeah. They definitely have been hit hard in the last decade with hard winters with horrible drought in between. And so we were seeing very depressed production rates as well as hard winters on top of it. And so there was just very few fawns backfilling those deer for a number of years. And so we had huge population decreases, huge tag decreases. The last couple of years we have seen that bounce. I looked the other day, Eastern Nevada is sitting right close to 100% for this year after starting out pretty horribly this winter. So Miracle March really saved that country's bacon, which was nice to see.

And so we bounced off the bottom there and starting to see quality coming back in all of those units to some degree, starting to see a lot more deer. Our surveys have been a lot more productive the last couple of years. And so a lot of room for hope there. Moving over to Area 14 and 15, I would say they were negatively affected by those drought years, but they definitely weren't hit nearly as hard in those winter years. And so they were really able to take advantage of those good water years, didn't have the overwinter fawn loss. And so those ones are kind of a year ahead of everything else. And so we've been, they've really been doing well for the last three years.

Just a lot of people talking about seeing a lot of deer, a lot more deer than they'd seen in, you know, the recent past. And so there's a lot of room for optimism in those two units for sure. And both of those units, we got a lot closer to our objectives last year with our tag recommendations and those that were approved by the commission. And so you'll see, you know, some minor increases there, but it's not nearly as shocking as the other unit groups. Okay. Awesome. Awesome. I would hate to leave 065 because I was a biologist for quite a while there and 065 got hammered by winners. And then there's a proposed mine and there's an incredible amount of exploration activity right in the heart of the summer range there. And so the potential for 065 is just for the number of deer is not what it once was. Yeah.

And yeah, it's a pretty sad state of affairs, but quality wise, definitely seeing a bounce back. Those tags have been really depressed for a number of years and it's starting to be reflected in success, you know, four points. It's number of days hunted. Everything is pointing towards, it's a lot better experience than it was a couple of years ago. Okay. And area 14 and 15, so the 140s and 150s. Back in the day, you guys had them as area, you know, areas. And so when we talk about that just for the general public to know, you know, area six would be all the 06s, area seven, all the 07s. But anyway, for 14 and 15 feels like it was this quantity over quality. It might be a genetic, might be a number of reasons why, but actually we're hearing a bit of an uptick in quality.

Like you said, maybe it's a year ahead or whatever, but there's some optimism there that I haven't really heard much before, especially maybe in 14. But you're seeing the same thing. Definitely. And I think both of those units are just a lot more prone to drought issues. And, you know, there's between the two, there's 10,000 ish horses. And so there's a lot of competition on a really pretty limited landscape. And so those drought issues definitely come out and you can see it. You'll, I mean, even with older age class bucks, we had a huge collaring study in there in the early 2010s. And one year you'd have this pretty exciting big buck. And then the next year he would come back as just a nothing, nothing to get excited about type of buck. And so I think a lot of that is playing out in real time right now.

And so there's, you know, with being 100 to 130 percent in all these water basins, it should be another good year. Okay. Before we leave, Scott, Devin, I know you have some specific questions. We've talked about some of the collaring and the migrations and some of the really interesting things. Yeah, I just, I mean, we, I saw doe on the Tawannels that we called on and she summered like north of Wild Horse. Like what's some of the farthest migration you've seen in that country? There's been a number that have been on that east side of Area 6 going down to the South Peak Wops. When I was there, a 10 biologist had a doe go from around Robinson Lake on the north end of 102. She ended up 30 something miles south of Highway 50 into Area 13. 13. Holy cow. Air miles. It's so crazy. Yeah, it was like 140 straight line air miles.

And knowing that she crossed the range multiple times, if you actually tracked it out, it'd be closer to 200. Area 6, we see, you know, numerous 70 plus mile movements. But 7 and 10 definitely have the longest deer ones that we've mapped so far. Super cool. The highway crossings, I mean, all that's helped a ton. I remember back in the day driving that and it was scary. Yeah. Before that, you know, but that's have to, I would assume that's helped a ton. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, in working with NDOT prior to those being installed, we were averaging 250 deer that they were picking up each year. That's not accounting for ones that were out in the brush, ones that limped off and died. So, yeah, you play that out over a number of years. It's a pretty incredible amount of deer that are being saved now. Yeah. Pretty crazy. Well, let's see.

Let's, Sean, I want to, before we dive into Joe and Joe, we can't have all the area biologists on at the same time. So it's a little bit hard. So we'll talk to Joe a little bit about some of that country down south that we like. Of course, it's closer to us. Devin's not as fond of it, but actually he is. I just like giving Devin a hard time. But, Sean, maybe speak a little bit to, you know, we've heard that it's tougher to go through the drought era than having a harsh winter. You know, tougher to recover from drought. And, of course, and I don't know, maybe you can speak a little bit to that. And then also maybe speak to the northeast corner. Back in the day, the Sheldon was the deer-producing mecca of Nevada and all of that country. And that has just totally changed. That was back in, you know, Tony Dybald and some of those old outfitters that just loved that country and whatnot.

Back, you know, we actually worked with them. And, I mean, that dates us a little bit too. But that's changed. All of that's changed. The horses and fires and 14 other, you know, issues. But maybe speak to that area of the state and then drought versus winter and just in general terms of what you see. Yeah. Yeah. And that's where, I mean, probably I've spent the majority of my time throughout my lifetime outdoors is in the northwestern portion of the state. And certainly it's changed a lot in terms of the dynamics there. But I guess the good news is, is we still have, you know, most of our sagebrush canopy available in the northwestern section of the state. When you get into 032, it starts to fade when you get into Humboldt County quite a bit. And it turns into more of a cheatgrass monoculture and lower elevations anyway.

But for that northwestern section of the state, we're seeing a bit of recovery in places like the Sheldon and Hunt Unit 011. But it certainly hasn't been what I would have hoped for over these last few years. I would say that over the last 20 years, except for the Mojave Desert, that that's been one of the driest places in the state. I don't think anybody can really appreciate the level of drought that has undergone in that portion of the state. 2018, the summer of 2018, was probably the driest I've ever seen in my lifetime, bar none. And you just walk by a sagebrush and most of the leaves would fall off and it would just break apart. And you can see how that has manifested itself over the years with at least the last few years, where you have half to 75 percent dead sagebrush plants with maybe a quarter to half of it still alive. So that obviously has an effect.

The other portion of it, too, is there's portions of northern Washoe County that get raised by livestock very heavily. The season of use is from April 1st through almost the end of October.

Plants don't get a chance to really recover out there. And I think that that's sort of manifesting itself over the years when we have all these dry periods and you get maybe two wet years in a decade. It's not enough. It's not enough to sustain animals out there. We're starting to see that manifest itself in sage-grouse populations as well. They're just not quite as productive. And we went through an exercise a couple of years ago where we took our sage-grouse wing bee data, which kind of gives us an idea of recruitment over the past 30 years. And we looked at that as opposed to our fawns per 100 adults in the springtime. And those trend lines are right on top of each other, highly cordial. So I think when you see these sagebrush obligates out on the landscape and they're just not being pretty productive, very productive, and you see two different species doing the same thing,

it kind of is pretty telling about what's going on in that landscape in general. So I would have thought with the removal of most all of the horses on the children, save for maybe 20 to 50 horses that are still out there, that we would have seen a positive response. I think we're kind of seeing that with Fronghorn. We're kind of seeing that with Mildare. The quality is not quite there yet. It's kind of looking like it's coming back. But, you know, we faced a couple of situations over the last two decades where Fronghorn just left the Sheldon completely. And they had to because it was virtually waterless out there. And so they had to go into Oregon to seek out water. And I think a lot of those animals did not return. And so it's just now starting to build itself back up again. But it's taken a long, long time. Wow. That's crazy.

Well, and that's, you know, what he's talking about with those prolonged periods of drought is probably what you affect these vegetative communities so harshly. And then you superimpose livestock grazing, you know, big game needing it, wild horses if you have that. And you can set that back for decades versus a winner, one hard winner. You may wipe out 80 to 90, 100% of your fawns and a higher than normal percentage of your adults and maybe 40% plus. But then what's left with a big snow load, your habitat now gets a slight break because there are less animals to eat it. And it's just got all the water it needs. So it can actually rebound and get these what we're seeing now in a year or two. Boom, two big fawn crops in a row versus the drought. Like, you can't just, you can't just, it can't ever get back on track again, you know. Yeah, Sean, you would echo that. It's what you're seeing.

Yeah, absolutely. And one of the things we've seen over the years, too, is that with that pressure over time, whether it's horses or livestock, and you graze it for that long, you start to lose your perennial grasses. And you replace it with more short-term annual species on the landscape or short-term perennials like sandbird and bluegrass that just doesn't have the value for our native wildlife species like perennials do. And say you get an event, a small fire or even a large fire, and you don't have those perennials on the landscape, your susceptibility to turn into that cheatgrass monoculture just exponentially increases when you don't have that on the landscape. The other thing we see, too, is that with that pressure is without those perennial grasses, animals start to shift, domestic or otherwise, and they'll browse.

And we'll see that browse start to be affected, particularly in the form of bitterbrush browse. So you'll go out there and you'll see bitterbrush that looks more like bonsai trees than they do bitterbrush bushes. And that's because they've been selected for so heavily because that's what's left to eat. And, of course, that's what our mule deer, in many cases, need to thrive on at certain times of the year. So you start affecting those communities and one thing leads to another. And, you know, I think that's why we're in the boat we are with mule deer and with Western Nevada. Okay. All right. Yeah, I appreciate that. That helps us a lot for that general region there. Maybe, Joe, do you want to, you know, don't want you to feel left out over there, down there in that south portion there. So talk about the state of mule deer in general and some of that country.

And then you can dive into some of the antelope as well. And we'll go to that point and then keep cranking. Got some other things to talk about. Of course, we're going to talk about desert sheep and all the challenges there, but then also some interesting tackles. So we'll get to that as well. But maybe address some of the deer and antelope and what you're seeing in general. And your involvement has been, you know, you guys are all intertwined. You probably know each other's regions very well also. Just a good group of individuals that care about the entire state. And so anyway, maybe you can address that, Joe, some of that country. Yeah, so Jason, I guess I'll kind of circle back before we start getting into the drought conditions and everything else that I've been dealing with. So you guys mentioned that you field hundreds of calls about Nevada every day.

And I'm assuming what you're going to tell them is with our application strategy, the way everything is, you at least have a chance. And when you draw a tag, you have a great experience. And that's what I'm going to attest to as I go and embark on maybe some reduced quotas that Scott was talking about. So I did help with a lot of aerial surveys in Lincoln County and central Nevada. We're still seeing plenty of quality on the landscape, obviously, with the fawn recruitment being in the low to mid 40s for your spring fawn recruitment. You're seeing a lot of uptick in those younger age class deer, but you're still seeing a lot of quality out on the landscape. For instance, you'll see the 23 or 231 quota where it's going from 45 to 95. Well, we tried to uptake it to about 65 last year, and then those tags were shifted to juniors. I just want to put it for reference.

That's for a postseason buck ratio of 45, to put it just as a reference point. I just want to know how many of those 45s or 200s. That's what I want to know. That's the conversation you and I have every time, Jason. I know. I know. I ask you what unit to apply for in Utah, Wyoming. I know. And I want you to have a quality experience. It doesn't have that 220 experience is always your answer. And I'm just like, what about the guy that will kill that 180 buck? I know. That is me. But what I do like is what I do like. And I want you to finish. I want you to totally finish out every thought you have on some of this stuff. All of you. But what I do like is Adam and I have talked about those surprises. When you have a reduction in quota, and then it comes up to this point where we should increase, but then the commission doesn't want to because of the public pressure.

And so you stack a few of those bucks, and they get just a little older. And a little older. And then right before you unleash the tags that you have, no choice. You're at 50 bucks. That's when you want to draw. Then you want to draw the year before you unleash the tags, and you have this most premium experience that would take another decade or two for all those variables to get into it. That's just for an extreme trophy hunter that I'm talking about. I'm not saying that's proper management. I'm just saying that's just Jason talking for a second. I know. That's why I had to bring that up. It's more just playing around. But I did notice that in 23, and 23, just from a general sportsman's perspective, is it feels like it hasn't produced the big deer that it's known to have produced. But one of these years, Adam and I talk about it, when is this surprise year of, wow,

23 really produced a bunch of big deer. And it feels like it's coming. But anyway, Joe, there are tag increases for 23 proposed. Yeah, and then we mentioned some of the collaring efforts, like in the northern part of the state, but we actually collared 43 mule deer a couple years ago in area 22, or a year and a half ago now. And that data is showing movements that you wouldn't believe, and a proportion of those deer aren't available during the hunting season. You'll see that reflected in quotas as well. That's another alternative unit. So it's kind of that predicament, you know, do you base it off of harvest metrics, since you're trying to figure out when to survey those deer, different things. Heck, we had some of those deer near the West Range, just across from Pioch, end up in area 12 and 11, and a couple in Utah.

Like, it's just, this data has been real informative, and how we tackle it's kind of the next step of the equation, because, you know, do you manage some of these populations as a whole, and then take a proportion out, say for 22 and 23? Like, that's something we're still exploring of how we manage that most effectively. But then you also mentioned area 16, 17, some of those units, where you're seeing some sizable increases. That truly has to do with buck ratios. I mean, like, the 16 buck ratio gets you down to about 37 postseason. So it's the same thing that we're talking about with the northern units. It's kind of the tail of two sides of the state, where you got, it seems like, south of Lincoln County, south of, like, Tonopah, extreme drought conditions, and then everywhere north you're seeing decent recruitment. You know, you're seeing some mild winters in these areas.

So everything, or quite a few, have a chance to survive. So we'll get into the, probably the more intensive drought conversation, I think, once we get to sheep here. But it'll, things for deer, they're not looking bad. No, they're actually looking pretty decent. We did, and Adam, tell me what you think too, but we did have a heavy drought this winter, this fall and winter. But then all of a sudden we're having this timely moisture. Thankfully, we needed it, you know, this February, I guess late February, March, April. Things just feel good. I don't think the, they're still going to be dried up springs. Like, overall, water table recessed, things like that. But as far as the vegetation, it just feels timely. It feels timely to me, you know, being March and April and May, coming in with some moisture. Yeah, it was looking pretty bleak leading up to that.

It was one of the driest winters we'd seen over here, which our winters here in Cedar City mirror a lot of Lincoln County and 231 and, you know, the lower 223, 240s, you know, as far as flow and what they get. Yeah, if it wasn't for the last 45, 50 days or whatever we're on now, I would have a whole, at least I think there's some hope. We're artificially greening things up, which is just to impact deer at the right time of year, whether their fawns or doe's about ready to fawn here in a couple months or bucks as they're growing out there's right now. Yeah, we're not filling reservoirs everywhere by any means, but we might eke out growing some big bucks and have some good ground cover for fawns when mamas start having them. What's your take on that, Joe? Yeah, moisture needs to coincide when greenup occurs and kind of as it continues, hopefully it does continue over the next month or two

and it prolongs those forbs and browse species and grasses to stay green longer and kind of keep things going into early midsummer. Okay, so should we dive in? Maybe, Joe, continue with this conversation on antelope, what you're seeing in some of that country. I know Area 25 is somewhat popular, 13, 16, 17, 18. I mean, there's good bucks on the landscape. Some of the heavy, very southern, 25 I know is super drought sensitive, and all of them are really, but they recover. Antelope seem to recover a bit quicker. But maybe talk about that. We've seen good quality bucks coming on. Like there's an excitement about it. Just maybe talk about that a little bit. Yeah, it might be a little biased. Antelope hunting is probably my favorite because it allows me to just go look at a bunch of animals without exerting maybe the same amount of effort as I would on a deer or an elk hunt.

But I had a 251 antelope tag a couple years ago, harvested a real nice 81-inch antelope just in the middle of Stone Camp Valley. I think opening day, just driving down the road. I mean, it can. That's life. That's living right there, drinking a Pepsi. Yeah, I'll tell you. Once we get to elk, I'll tell you more of the horror stories. But it'll know. And Scott can attest to this when he speaks to a lot of his units. Antelope are doing well. It seems like, you know, as you know, with antelope biology, once you get to about three, four years of age, you're reaching your max potential. So a lot of the units that I oversee, you know, exhibited terrible drought conditions 2020 through 2022. But now you're seeing the ramifications of a couple good years. And you should, as we start to go into the next couple years, continue to see that uptick and see some pretty good quality on the landscape.

And some of that's reflected in the harvest, but some of it's not. Like unit 25 might be 12% to 15%, 15-inch or better. But I know they're out there. And you just, if you spend some time, I like to say any Nevada antelope unit, you've got a chance at an 80-inch buck. Any single one of them. That's what it does feel like. Maybe, Scott, chime in on what you're seeing up there in your country. You know, quality-wise, numbers-wise, feels good. What are you seeing up there? Yeah, numbers-wise, it's just off the charts. It's, we surveyed 3,000 more pronghorn than we ever had as a region.

Had over 3,000 in that 14-15 unit group. And that was with not going to a number of valleys just due to access and muddy and snowy conditions. So, yeah, it's pretty unprecedented for eastern region pronghorn, where all-time highs in pretty much all the unit groups set all-time high survey samples and had the best fawn ratio ever, best buck ratio more or less ever. It was lower than one in the 1970s where they saw like 500 antelope in the region. So, I think we can say it's the best ever. And, yeah, just everything's pointing up right now. And we've been throwing, you know, hundreds of doe tags at them, and we're not slowing anything down for the most part. And, yeah, good things are happening. And there were a number of really nice bucks taken in the region last year. Saw a couple that were in that, you know, really top-end type bucks, 85 to 87 north of Elko,

which doesn't happen that often. And with the mild winter that we've had and just green, nice conditions that we're seemingly going into summer with, should be primed for pretty awesome antelope hunting this year. You can hardly hold back your smile. I know. I mean, how awesome is that? It's a nice change to hear that. And, I mean, from what you're saying, never been better on all fronts. I mean, is that what you're saying in all aspects of survey? That's totally accurate. Yeah. I mean, those drought years. I mean, come on. Who doesn't want to go right now? Like, it's fired me up. Are you off your waiting period? I am. I'm back in. All right. My three years is up. I mean, it's fun. It's nice to have something to smile about. I just, it's, I mean, it's just, jeez, thousands. Did you hear that? The thousands. I've seen it. I know how much. Why haven't you been telling us about it, Devin?

Why have you not been telling us? I've seen antelope at 9,000 feet, man. That's like, the place is loaded. So is there, just speak to the habitat. You got the habitat for it. Are we good? I mean, do we have to throw all these doe tags? You want to kind of curtail it a little, I'm sure. But what about, can the habitat sustain it all? You know, a lot of the reason that they're doing so well is, you know, historical burns. And a lot of the issues that are facing mule deer are benefiting pronghorn in these situations. And so part of it where we have overlapping winter ranges between, you know, thousands of antelope and thousands of deer, we're choosing to keep those relatively stable. Other areas where we don't have that overlap or that potential competition, we're letting them go. But like I said, the 14, 15 unit group, we're killing over 500 antelope a year out of there

and not slowing anything down. Wow. So, and then, I mean, just circling back to those drought years, the south and the eastern region. So, 11, 12, 13, parts of 14 and 16 there. During those drought years, we were running fawn ratios in the single digits.

So, we're seeing, you know, tenfold increase in fawn ratios. And so, we had major population contractions during those years. And now we're bouncing back into, you know, record surveys, record estimates. So, yeah. Is there a bad unit? I mean, can you definitively say, you know, it just feels like, or is what Joe's saying, you can go anywhere? No, there's definitely Boone and Crockett bucks in every unit group. Oh, for sure. Just how far do you want to drive, huh, Devin? Hey, I'm driving. I got good gas mileage in my little diesel. That little diesel's no joke. I'll come with you. You going to pay off your gas? For antelope? Pretty awesome. Pretty awesome. I like hearing that. That's great. Maybe, Sean, can you, you have anything to add? I'm sure as you've been listening to some of this on antelope as the overall game division administrator.

Anything you've got to add that you would like thrown out there? Yeah. Yeah. Our statewide population estimate for antelope is 36,500 animals, which is higher than we've ever, at least that I know, recorded. Yes. In our 1983 Fronghorn Antelope Species Management Plan, they identified an objective in 2000 of 24,500 antelope. So we've blown past that by almost 12,000 animals. So antelope have responded to, you know, changes in weather patterns, changes in the landscape, like Scott mentioned, especially in places where you get, you know, a more desirable response after fires. Get these cheatgrass monocultures with pansy mustard. You know, that's not really good for anything, but where you get these warm, next perennial grass landscapes with different annual forbs in it. Sometimes that has a pretty good benefit for Fronghorn. So we're living that right now.

Even in your corner of the world, and, you know, that Northwest stuff, I call it Northeast sometimes because I'm an idiot, but Northwest stuff, you're seeing some of that over there as well. Yeah. It's not as pronounced as what we're seeing today in Central Nevada or Northeastern Nevada. Yeah. There's a unit group, 043 through 046, that spans from basically just south of Winnemucca from I-80 near Rypatch Reservoir over to kind of Battle Mountain. And that Fronghorn herd is almost exponentially increasing along with Area 15. And so whatever's going on there is really benefiting antelope to a high degree. So, and, you know, I think we're going to start to see some more mature bucks, some higher quality bucks come out of there. But what's happening in Northeastern Nevada in terms of quality, it's really replaced Northwestern Nevada in terms of the go-to spot for antelope. There you go.

So that's closer, a little closer drive. Yeah. For us, Utah. I don't care. Hey, we'd drive anywhere for an antelope, right, Brownson? It's better to drive to the Idaho-Nevada border than the California-Nevada border. It's pretty fun. If you live where we live. But yeah, it's exciting. Maybe, Sean, since you're up and you're speaking already, you want to maybe set the stage for elk. We'll dive into elk a little bit. And I know Joe's just chomping. We're going to let him chomp on these desert sheep for a minute because we're going to end on that. I'm going to tease him a bit and we'll talk about all that. And it's fun. We're excited about it, actually, with some of the different tag quotas just because there's some things that have to happen, right? And so anyway, we'll dive into that. But maybe set the stage for elk in Nevada. Sure. Yeah. Elk are doing well throughout most of the state.

No real big changes from a bull quota standpoint. I think we're up about 6%. We're recommending maybe 12% more cow tags. Some of it's in line with where we want to be. But from a quality standpoint, I was looking through some of these metrics the other day. And we had 747 bulls harvested last year.

272 of them had 50-inch main beam or greater. So 36% of our bulls are 50-inch main beam or greater, which is oppressive.

And we're actually keeping your objective. That's why you want to hunt Nevada for elk. Yeah, that's exactly right. You want to. It's just hard to get a tag. But when you get one, you got something. Get in line. Yep. So keep going. You got any? What else you got there? And 72% of the bulls that were harvested were 6-pointer greater. Wow. This is of the average general public that gets a tag. Not everybody's a trophy hunter, you know, kind of like Jonah Tees. And it's across all units. Like any Nevada elk tag is a trophy elk hunt. Any and every single one.

Yeah. And we're seeing some recovery in the northeastern portion of the state in terms of quality as well. So, you know, it's definitely the only thing that we're dealing with that's been an issue for us in the northeastern part of the state is managing numbers. It's managing numbers to objective. It does seem like you guys are careful with that just because, you know, maybe limited habitat and whatnot, just dealing with Nevada and also, you know, under proper game management. Also dealing with elk that travel to Idaho and, you know, and trying to deal with what that looks like. And how do you manage, you know, that? It's somewhat tough. It's super difficult between some of our hunt unit groups. We've got state issues where we have animals that move between different states quite a bit more than one might think.

And then the ones that move between hunt unit groups and then we've got, you know, an incentive tag program where you've got folks that may be managing more for elk than they have in the past, which changes the dynamic to the movement of animals. And so definitely a lot of dynamics and intricacies that, but overall a good success story, right? It's just, it can be from a management standpoint, it can be a lot of time and tender loving care to deal with elk for sure. Well, and you get, and Scott was talking about, you know, some of the area 14 and 15 antelope being bulletproof, you know, you know, just growing despite heavy harvest. Well, we know what elk can do. So you're also, you gotta be, you gotta be on top of them because they're even, they're as bad as a coyote, you know? They'll live everywhere. You can't kill them. They'll go everywhere. They handle the weather.

They only die from lead poisoning, you know, stuff like that. So you've gotta, and there's overlap with ranching communities, whether it be on private land or primatees or things like that. So yeah, you know, elk are, they eat a lot more. So there's a lot of reasons you can't just back off. You have to have the tender loving care principle. You gotta be on top of it. So you don't, you know, run at issues where, yeah, habitat problems are an issue or, you know, then you get into a drought and you've got thousand too many elk on the landscape or whatever. So those are significant issues. And so maybe Scott dive into, you know, back to you for a quick sec and then we'll go to Joe. But, you know, what are you seeing? And obviously area six has had its challenges too. You might address that just a little bit, but, but the O sevens and, and other units in your basic area. Yeah.

Yeah. And, um, just backing up a little bit, but all of our unit groups have population objectives for the most part. Six, one, seven ones, um, uses habitat objectives to dictate the numbers, but most of them have a hard number. And that was set through a social process, not through a biological carrying capacity or anything along those lines. Okay. And so that's where we really run into issues is trying to maintain quality, maintain, you know, hunter satisfaction, as well as maintain these artificially low population objectives in a lot of these unit groups. So it could be better. Could be better. I mean, it could be higher numbers of elk. It could totally handle it. It's just, you're dealing with the social part of it. Absolutely. And I mean, you know, factors of five or 10 and some of the unit groups. Wow.

And so you brought up area six, you know, that six, two through six, eight unit groups, huge area, numerous, you know, suitable mountain ranges. And we have a population objective of 500 in there. Yeah. And you can have that walk across the border of a reservation and you can be, you can either have zero elk or you can have a thousand elk. It just depends on which side of the fence they're on. Right. And so it makes management excessively difficult. So, um, John said, you know, most of our areas are within our bull objectives. You know, we're not looking at a bull ratio in that scenario just because, um, all of those objectives left us long ago. So we're trying to maintain a quality hunt there and then do your population management through the cow harvest. Okay. Um, which if you're at a maintenance level is totally or pretty doable.

Um, but when you allow those populations to get past objective and then you have to knock them down to objective, you have to target both bulls and cows in those scenarios. Those are, you just end up with 1200 bulls in a unit group and not have anything to produce any calves. And that's kind of where we're at in that 076 unit group. I know Devin's familiar with, um, we overshot those objectives and that's why you're seeing those increases this year. If, if we had our druthers and we were just managing, you know, at bull objectives, we wouldn't see any changes in those quotas this year, but because we're so far over in both cows and bulls, uh, we have to start chipping away at both of them. And so we're going to see sizable increases in all of those, or at least proposed sizable increases across the board.

Um, most of the other unit groups were close enough to be close enough to objective to where we're, um, you know, just tightrope walking, uh, with last year's recruitment class. And just like everything else, recruitment's off the charts the last two years. And so a lot of the quota increases in cows is just accounting for that. Yeah. Is there any chance that you, do you see any change or potential for change on, on population objectives? If it's just based on social or we, I mean, is it something you just said, oh, let's just raise the, you know, the population objective a little bit and enjoy the, enjoy it a little bit, or is it just not really in the carts? We are in the process of, uh, updating our species management plan. Our statewide one was written in 1997 and has seen, you know, a few sub plan revisions, but very little revision to the actual statewide plan since then.

And so through that process, there's potential, but, um, yeah, it's really up to, you know, the commission and other social entities pressures. Yeah. Yeah. Livestock interest, county advisory boards, all that type of stuff. Yeah. Any questions, Devin? You're thinking. No, it's interesting. I'm learning a lot. He's on an elk waiting period. He doesn't care. He's all, he's, he's still in an animal. I'm in elk jail too. Yeah. But that country with those elk, there's so much movement, movement too. Just like we talked with the deer specifically in that country. Like I've seen bulls September and then been on a late hunt, seen the same bull. And I mean, it shocked me, you know, or just finding the elk in general, how far they go. It's, it's, it's interesting. Very unique in that country. You know, that country, you're, you're losing elk, you're gaining elk to Idaho.

You're doing the same to Utah. Utah. Everybody has callers that have showed that movement. We're losing them to other unit groups. And so, yeah, it, it can be pretty tricky when one side of the roads at objective and the other side's grossly over. It's hard to keep that, you know, consistent pressure on them to where they don't run across the road and cause problems. Yeah. Seeing good quality in, in area 12 too. You know, the last several years, especially it seems like I may, and I think it's been good for quite some time, but maybe speak to that just a little. Yeah. I mean, area 11 continues to be awesome. Area 12 is definitely producing at a high rate. The, like so many places, pine nuts really cause a dip in hunt success last year, but quality still maintained throughout, um, you know, just talking to people that have hunted, uh, unit group for a number of years in a row.

And just saying that, you know, we usually go to this basin and see X amount of bulls and they were going there and not seeing anything for a number of days. And yeah, but just knowing that you're seeing the same amount of tracks, the same, um, same sign and everything else, uh, pine nuts just, they don't have to come out and feed. You know what I mean? They're just, they're in the thick trees and a little bit tougher. Joe and Joe, what do you say? Similar perception. We're seeing great quality and 11, like what you're talking about there, Scott, just, I mean, just from the hunter side, uh, in dealing with, uh, hunt hunters, submitting photos and all the hunt success stories and all of the things dealing with the guides and whatnot, area 11, 22, 23, you know, continue to be just great. I mean, it seems like Ely country especially has been great for, I want to say decades, you

know, it's, you see these ebbs and flows in a lot of other States. It just feels like Ely's been great since, I mean, a hundred in year 2000. It was great. We were hunting 400 inch bulls in 2000, 25 years ago. And so anyway, continues to be just awesome. Uh, something where everybody, everybody wants to tag there. Right. And so maybe Joe chime in on, on what you're seeing as well. Yeah. Everything's looking good in 23. Um, some of the movement that we discussed earlier, this unit is always an enigma. Um, you got the Geyser ranch, which could have 450 elk on it in the middle of the summer and turn into the Serengeti during the rut. But, and then, but you look at harvest metrics, um, 50 inch main beam, everything looks great. And it's, we've had collared elk in there and shown movement from 22 to there to Utah back and forth on any given Sunday.

So it's, we conduct our aerial surveys in January and, and that informs us to the best of our ability, but then we really rely on the harvest metrics in there. But even 16, we're seeing some quality in these days. It's, it's not just one unit. It's not just Ely country. I mean, and Scott can attest to this. If you, it seems like if you find a good bull in area 13, it's a good bull, but then otherwise the success rates maybe aren't great. But when you look at those harvest metrics and compare it to, I mean, I've got, I applied for a lot of Western states and have max points in places and I'm applying for hunts where I'm going to be excited to go see a three 25 bull. And you know, it's, that's just not Nevada. You have the opportunity to find that three 50 last bull in a lot of these units. Pretty awesome there.

Um, Sean, have we missed anything as we've been discussing or anything come to mind just as, as an over overarching, uh, opinion or whatnot on, on elk in Nevada? I don't think so, Jason. I mean, we talked about movement and, you know, when you think about how elk around White Pine County, for example, might exist on the landscape and, you know, you've got all these different mountain ranges and you just think those animals are specific to like the North snake range in 114, the South, South snake range in 115. They're really not, they can move between all of those mountain ranges and the shell freaks. And it's, it's pretty awesome to think about how they use that landscape and how mobile they are. Um, we kind of thought that maybe, uh, that winter at 22 had an effect. Uh, if any winter would have, that probably would have been it, but, um, it might have to

us to a degree, but certainly not like we saw for deer or anything like that. So, um, yeah, no, elk are elk are doing fine. And in some places better than we need them to. So, uh, that's not true. That's not true. We love it. What we love about Nevada, it just feels like that's a destination state that everybody aspires to go to. And, and, uh, it's pretty cool to be that, uh, you know, on the flip side of it, um, be nice to draw a little more often. So there is, there is that balance, but man, what a special place it is for, for elk. It really is. It's commendable, uh, what you guys do with the limited resource and habitat and whatnot that you have. I guess, unless somebody else has something that you want to talk about there, Sean, you could set us up for talking about sheep and desert sheep and whatnot.

Um, yeah, so certainly, you know, we're in a place with our, our desert bighorn, uh, largely due to drought, uh, issues here recently. But overall, I would say in the last decade, um, disease issues, that's not uncommon for any state with desert bighorn has had to deal with over the last decade, um, has caused us, particularly about four or five years ago. Um, a lot of issues with, uh, dwindling population size, uh, lower recruitment levels. It seems like we're starting to climb out of that now, um, especially in some of our, our more northern ranges. Um, but, uh, we just, we just have a situation right now in the extreme portion of Southern Nevada, where, uh, we went through about from the summer to, oh, I guess it was almost mid February where I think we had 214 or so days without a drop of rain. Wow. Um, so a lot of our water developments, uh, specifically for bighorn went dry.

You can imagine what that did to the vegetation on the landscape, uh, and how dry it made that the growing season, you know, usually is from all about, uh, late October, mid November through, um, February. And we just didn't receive anything during that, that timeframe. Um, Barring that we have a population of sheep down there and unit 268, 268, the muddy mountains, which somehow defies all logic, uh, and acts more like a wild horse bird in some respects and seems to be pretty productive and in high numbers, uh, which, uh, is befuddling in some respects that it continues to do that. It has not knock on wood, um, experienced, uh, disease issues like a lot of the other birds, uh, in the neighborhood.

Um, but, uh, the situation remains that it's, it's virtually a free water less area in the north, in the southern portion of the state, largely relies on water developments, uh, except for a few springs here and natural springs here and there. So we're in a situation where we have to move sheep out of the legs and we have to deal with an expanded population of sheep. We estimate about 600 or so sheep in that population and actually, and Joe can speak to this better than I can physically surveyed, you know, over 440 sheep in that mountain range. And it's got a, it's got a high ram ratio. It's got a pretty high lamb ratio, despite all of the, uh, maladies that I described earlier. Um, so there's, there's some management challenges that we have with that particular herd.

We have some other mountain ranges nearby that are, um, like the arrow canyons, hunting unit 244, which are also looking, uh, fairly positive in terms of numbers of animals, number of mature rams. But, uh, uh, uh, landscape that really may not be able to sustain those animals as we move into the summertime. Um, and there's a couple other mountain ranges like that too, that, you know, unfortunately we had, uh, fairly decent population size. Um, some issues with disease for sure, but we have mature ram segment that was, that was looking, you know, pretty good. Um, you know, most people want to hunt places like, uh, the McCulloch's, but unit 263, which is quality. But, um, that particular herd has various strains of mycoplasma, um, affecting that population. Um, pretty bad drought conditions. We've had to haul water to several developments there.

Um, you know, it has a little bit of diversity in terms of the mountain range that exists on maybe a little bit more, um, resiliency, not much, but, um, definitely, um, there's going to be challenges in the future for that bird unless some things change. Um, as you get further north in Nevada into those more central Nevada units, um, dealing with a lot of disease issues, but as you get towards Churchill County, there's a few mountain ranges like the Clan Alpine range and the Desentoya range that, um, really rebounded in terms of lamb ratios. So we're getting more productive there, uh, and, and the quality of rams is looking really good in the Westman units too. So that's kind of a statewide overview from South and North of what we're looking at. Great. Yeah, that's awesome. Appreciate that. Joe, you can chime in here. We'd sure like to hear your opinion.

You've been intimately involved and you, you care as a sportsman, let alone the biologist and, and been over that region for, uh, for quite a bit of time and dealt with all of that, everything to do with everything that we're talking about. And so chime in here on, on what you're seeing, um, of course, from a non-resident perspective, you know, it's, it's, it's been nice to, to be able to go. There's high pop, there has been high population still in all reality, fairly high populations considering other States and whatnot. So while we're seeing a major dip due to drought and other, uh, disease and other issues, um, still a positivity there, uh, from, from our perspective, it's hard to watch things get knocked down. Just like we watch deer and other things struggle over the course of, of time, whether it be winter loss or droughts and things like that.

But, but having said all that still an optimist and optimism there, um, you know, knowing that it's not always going to be this way, you know, we're going to, we're going to see some positive, positive change there. And we're starting to see that as Sean indicated, but maybe dive in on, you know, teach us some things that you're seeing out there, what you've seen and, and, uh, in the future as well. Yeah. So Sean set that up pretty well. Um, I've been living this probably the last five years. It was the worst day of my career when we were flying in the muddy mountain wilderness around the Jerry water development in 2020. And there was 2025 dead bighorn sheep right on a guzzler. Um, we've had two good years out of the last five years, but the three bad years have been terrible.

And so, as I mentioned at the beginning of this discussion, we're hauling since December to our 14 different mountain range and about our 30 different water development. And we still got to finish out the rest of the week. And that's just to get us, you know, 70, 80% in some projects, you know, or start off as we get into the warm season. So it's, unless if we get monsoonal precipitation, it's, you know, during the summer months, this is going to be a reoccurring event. Um, we went out and thanks to our gracious, um, or we're very thankful to our NGOs, to you, you know, the fraternity, MBU, all the MBUs, all the different NGOs. I mean, we've raised over a million dollars for a project for these aerial water halls. And we're actually going to embark on a large sheep translocation in June, where we're going to move up to 150 sheep from unit 268.

Um, up to 50 is going to go to year grade state of Utah. And then we're going to, based off NEPA compliance, move, you know, up to 60 to the Cortez range and 141. And then the Tobins and 045, we actually evaluated a lot more sites where we, you know, Sean mentioned the bacterial pneumonia aspect of it. So we went and pre-sampled a lot of different units, 182, 183, 045, 202, um, the Excelsior range, where we went and sampled a lot of yearling individuals to see if they had recent exposure from the blood serology test versus the nasal swab. And that just indicates that there's active infection on the landscape. So the only units that came back completely negative through the ELISA testing was 045 and then 141 is a reintroduction. So we have to get aggressive with those quotas in there.

That's why you're seeing the RAM quota as high as you are with 75 total tags, including the archery and the U quota of 100. We've got to get that population down to a more manageable level. In 268. Yeah, we can't keep hauling water at this level. It's just not sustainable. So your point is, is here and there we'll haul water and we're good with that. But when we're dealing with the overall feed quality and the overall, you know, water year after year after year, at some point, it just can't sustain it. You know, at some point with this particular weather pattern that we're in. Yeah, eventually mother nature is going to take care of itself, unfortunately, because there's not the vegetative groceries on the landscape. So you're just, you're trying to find, you know, they've responded well the last couple of years because we have decent moisture patterns with high lamb recruitment.

You know, Sean mentioned it with classified 442 animals with lamb representation of 42, where replacement for sheep's about 30. So you're constantly having an increasing population when you have those lamb ratios. And we just can't keep doing what we were doing and expect to maintain it. I'm about to lose my mind because it just seems like Groundhog Day. And you just think about the resources where we're not spending it on the other species that we're very passionate about that we're utilizing. And then, you know, like I said, thank you to our NGO community. We couldn't do it without you guys. But and the volunteers on the ground. But it gets to a point where you've got to manage it at a level that's sustainable. And that's why you're seeing what we're doing there. And then you mentioned some of the other sheep herds.

You know, you look at the quality metrics or 263, the McCullows, the Arrows, you know, the 244. You see the Meadow Valleys now has a non-resident tag. There are some exciting. We appreciate that. Opportunities for non-residents out there where they will have the you know, if they can hike in some of those units and know what sheep look like there. There is potential for book class rams. So even in spite of these drought conditions. But it's like every species we talk about. If that lamb is born to a malnourish ewe or that fawn is born to a doe, not in the greatest body condition, or they're struggling to keep them alive. They're never going to be that next level animal. And so it's it's just hard when you're trying to balance those expectations with what reality is on the landscape. Yeah. Sad but true. That's that's fine. That's the fact. So, yeah.

So for like two, six, eight, you're going to do you're you're going to transplant a bunch on top of that. We're talking about putting in two seasons with 30 resident tags each, three non-resident tags each. I mean, the positive side is is we're going to utilize this resource and people are going to be able to draw like there's more people going to be able to draw. There's a positive side. There's plenty of mature rams, six year old plus rams on landscape. We see them on survey. There's a lot of five year old that cohort coming in like it's you're going to have the opportunity to harvest a mature ram even at these quota levels. It just may not be the book ram that everybody has become accustomed to. But times have changed. I mean, look at our statewide population estimate the last five to seven years where twelve thousand to seven like it's it's resonating all throughout.

And we just between disease, drought, everything else. We just have to use the best management practices and not put naive sheep in a bad situation and evaluate on a side by side basis. But we still I mean, we're still talking a couple hundred ram tags, you know, in relation to other states. It's not like that's not like the bottom's completely fallen out of it. That's right. Yeah, that's what we're seeing. I think, too, is what you're doing to educate the public on why you're doing what you're doing. You know, the commission gets to decide. Right. So but and they're answering to the public and they're answering, you know, to themselves and you guys and proper management and weighing out all of these things. But I think it's good to educate everybody. This is what I'm seeing. And I'm not joking about it. I see I see 20 X amount of dead sheep around the guzzler or this is not sustainable.

And I think that education piece goes a long ways to getting the support you need to manage the way you feel like it needs to be managed as an as in doubt. Not Joe, necessarily in doubt. And of course, you're a major part of that because this isn't you that wants it. This is proper management. I mean, you're you're the one that's seeing it and reporting it and dealing with the numbers. And then at some point you all come together and say, these are some of the things we think we need to do. We have to do this, you know. And so anyway, commendable, hard, hard to do that. It's hard to, you know, be a major reason why the population is going to have to shrink. I mean, that's not that's counterintuitive to knock a population down when you've got good sheep numbers. Yeah, but I always like to see it as a success story. Right.

We have the opportunity of a disease free population to move upwards of 150 of them, allow people the opportunity to go out there and harvest some. Like, where can you harvest that many sheep in a unit and still be OK? I can't think like that's that's where I look at is kind of a positive story. I mean, everybody might say, well, why did you buy these water developments remotely and everything? I mean, we wouldn't have the sheepherds we do throughout the state of Nevada if these water developments weren't built. But now we just have to manage with the current climate that we're experiencing. So you just got to adaptively manage and build some of these guzzlers bigger and then adaptively manage, build them to where you could drive to them. It's just it just takes time to build your way out of some of these situations.

And you got to have to the hard realization that maybe the levels you had pre 2020 aren't what you could sustain on landscape anymore.

Yeah, true. We've been there. We've seen it with our own eyes, Jason. So it's it's pretty amazing how dependent they are on these water sources down there in Nevada. And we all know how freaking hot it is. So it's like how they stay alive and rut during all that period of time. And then obviously when they run out, they there's nothing for them to do. They've drank their whole life out of an artificial water source, you know. So sad. You got to do it. And you're you're you're banking on knocking them down now and hopefully with good weather, you know, and better, more consistent, not these two or three years in a row of a decent monsoon and then a shutoff for six or seven months of nothing, you know, to where they have to use these water developments through the winter months, which they almost never usually did or have to. They've become reliant on in these winter months.

Yeah, we're we're seeing them go on the water developments earlier. They're utilizing them as we speak, which that's unprecedented. Normally you get to the May, June time frame before they start utilizing. But in December, I was jumping 20, 30 sheep off of pretty much dry, dry water developments. But we were monitoring and they expected once it got to the cool season, they can move off. But we didn't get that moisture in late November to allow that green up that you would expect. And then those cooler temperatures and they could utilize resources away from those projects. So it's it's all related, you know, of how they're hammering those resources within a couple of mile span of those water developments. Wild times. But but again, I think, Joe, it speaks like it is. It's not all doom and gloom. Still really good. Cut it in half and it's really good.

Considering any other state, considering Utah. You know, Arizona is great. But New Mexico has its challenges numbers wise, although, you know, has some great quality. We're seeing some changes there, too, in overall quality and and what numbers and whatnot. And that's just part of cycle. Things cycle. Not always not always great. However, bad in Nevada for desert sheep. Still great, I guess, is kind of a positive spin on that. And I like what you were saying with that is what a success story that is.

So anything else you want to add on that, Joe? Of course, you've regurgitated this 14,000 times to everybody within the agency and then the public that's reaching out and whatnot. I'm sure you're somewhat nauseated with it. But at the same time, you're passionate about it. And so, yeah. Have we missed anything on that? The one thing I would say for non-resident sheep opportunities is when you look at 18 and then compare that with other states' total quotas. Just think about that as you tell your folks.

All right. Okay. Sounds good. And then, Scott, have you got anything to add up there? We don't want to leave you out. Maybe you can talk about some of the goats and Rockies and anything else that kind of comes to mind up there.

Yeah, goats have been really exciting the last couple of years. We've had fantastic recruitment rates, specifically in 102 and the rubies itself. And we saw a pretty sizable increase in tags a couple of years ago. And we're going to see another small increase, two more tags in there this year. We're just seeing fantastic growth. There's a ton of young billies on the landscape. That really came out in the harvest last year. There was a lot of young goats taken, but they were all billies, which was the first time since mid-90s that we didn't have any nannies harvested. So good things are happening there. We're going to see another year. We're going to see a lot of goats this year from the beaver unit down there and move those goats in there. Everybody's alive and happy. And, yeah, good things seem to be happening.

And with that increase in recruitment the last couple of years, and we had a better than expected survey this past summer, we're going to see a, you know, one tag increase. But it's pretty fantastic after, you know, 15 years of just being totally depressed in there. And then 103, it's just 103. It's just a couple dozen goats just plodding along right in the middle of a domestic sheep allotment. And they never seem to do too well, but they never seem to do too bad. Never go away. It's always there. Last 20 years, they're always there. Yeah. And then Rockies, you know, pretty short conversation. Had the two tags in 102.

Quite a few rams. On the landscape, awesome age structure. I'm sure you guys see pictures every once in a while. Yeah, there's the hunters had some difficulty last year. And I think a lot of that just had to do with fantastic high elevation conditions and had sheep just scattered to the wind. They weren't in the ram groups weren't in their normal, you know, canyons or rocky points that they normally are in. And then 115, just a struggle with the winter this year. Didn't have enough winter weather to push them out of the park. The hunter worked his tail off and just it didn't come together. But there'll be one tagging there again.

Awesome. When are you going to let us at these moose? I mean, it's a little revenue generator on the app fees. I'm just going to throw that out there. That's what we have to offer you, some app fees. Yeah. Maybe grab a point. We could buy a point. I don't know. But I'm just saying, I know you got probably more than you realize. I don't know. But, you know, maybe once every 10 years throw a non-resident attack. I don't know. Let's get creative there. But pretty fun. It's fun. It's interesting. And it's fun to watch and fun to learn about it. Of course, we don't have a tag as a non-resident. But still really interesting. I'm glad you guys are hunting them. I'm just lighthearted about it. But, yeah, seriously, when are we getting the tag? Yeah. I don't know. We didn't think we'd be hunting them this soon. So it might only be a handful of years. But, yeah, proposing two more tags in there.

Both bulls that were harvested last year were four-year-olds, both mid-40s. Just nice bulls. And there's a ton of older age class bulls out there. You know, it's a huge hunt area. And hopefully with time, some people will spend, you know, more time out there and really take advantage of all the opportunities. Last year, they both hunted a handful of days. And we're done in early September. So, yeah. As soon as we get to 10 resident bull tags, Jason. I know. And I'm just saying, I don't see a problem. Let's throw 10. I don't see a problem. We know the standard answer. We just want it a little sooner than that. I know it's a 10% rule. We're just, ugh. Anyway. Come on. You got your mountain goat tag back. Let's not be greedy. I'll tell you what we'll do. Let's meet in the middle. You guys give a silver state tag. And then at least we can apply for it. It's going to be a revenue generator.

It's not going to hurt a thing having a third tag. Let's run that by the commission. Run that by the commission. In fact, let's just, Bronson and Carter. We'll even throw Devin in there. Devin, do you dare stamp your name on this and make some people mad? Why not? Let's do a silver state. As long as we don't have to drive somewhere to go to the commission, I'll be in. Put the name on it. Anyway, silver state moose. It's not a bad idea. I'm just saying. Not a bad idea. And then at least, hey, non-resident could have a chance. Probably going to go to a resident. But we'd have a chance. But anyway, pretty fun to talk about and whatnot. I guess as we wrap up and, you know, if there's something we missed, I'd like you guys to address it. But I just, we love talking about Nevada. It is somewhat tough to draw on.

When you're dealing with the quality that you guys are aspiring to have, your commission's pushing you, the public's pushing you, generally resident pressure. And whatnot. You know, you're going to have limited tags. And there's two sides to drawing odds. There's applicants and there's tags. And so when you have limited tags and you're trying to deal with a quality resource and a quality experience and a quality product. As old Jack used to say, like, you know, proud to produce a quality product. And I feel like you do that. And so I don't mind. I like supporting your state. Me and my entire family buying hunting licenses and many years not entering your state but feeling like that's a good contribution to continuing to help you guys afford to manage wildlife proper. And having a quality experience.

And so, anyway, those are, you know, and even playing some of the PIW and the Silver State and the Dream Tags and whatnot is when you see a state trying to do what they're doing and coming out like they are and having buck to doe ratios the way they do and bull to cow and everything else. Dealing with challenges on desert sheep but still offering more tags than anyone else. It's pretty easy to support them. And as a non-resident and also treating our youth the way you do, you know, for $15 non-resident youth license to dive in and to participate and to gain points and whatnot. Hey, we appreciate it. And, you know, trying to make those application dollars stretch as best you can but still play the game like Joe indicated and playing in other states as well. So, anyway, we appreciate what you do. We appreciate you guys being on.

But anything else that we've missed, Bronson, that you wanted to kind of bring up on some of your thoughts? No, I just, yeah, I want to give them a chance to, if we haven't covered something that they felt like is noteworthy from a 2025 perspective in Nevada this year, I want a chance for them to end on that so that we can wrap it up. We appreciate you guys' time. It's been very informative. I think a lot of listeners are going to learn a lot and get after and get their applications in now, apply accordingly. So anything you guys want to hit, you three, that we haven't covered in depth enough? I don't think so. From my perspective, we've covered quite a bit of territory. We've certainly given your listeners quite a bit of fodder to listen to as they drive to and from wherever they go and whatever they may draw coming up this next year,

hopefully in the state of Nevada and get to experience, you know, something that's pretty unique and, you know, that most folks that draw Nevada can have a fairly reasonable chance of, you know, getting an animal that they dream of. So as they're driving back and forth across this state or your state, hopefully they've gotten something out of this. Appreciate it, Sean. Thanks a lot. So I do have, I guess, Wyatt brought this up. Wyatt brought this up. Maybe, Sean, you can address this or anybody that knows the answer. But he was like, ask him what the predator fee. Oh, your option? Yeah, you got the option of habitat and predator. Like, that money, it's a $3 fee, I think it is. But tell me, like, does that go into a fund? Does it go into aerial removal? I mean, is it a particular hotspot? So, you know, what dictates some of that as we pay that fee?

Yeah, so that underwent a change last year where folks could kind of dictate where they wanted their funding to go to. And when they, as you guys know, when you apply for each species, it asks you at the end of the application period when you get charged that $3 fee where you want that to go. The split last year was around 64% towards lethal control of predators and 36% to nonlethal work, which we call it our habitat restoration and management portion of that fee. That portion basically follows our heritage process, our wildlife heritage trust account process. And so we accept proposals for that funding. And then it goes through a ranking process. And then that funding is doled out based on value of whoever might propose whatever they want to do. And then the other portion actually gets allocated and moves through our predator plan process, which we conduct annually.

Joe is overseeing that program now. I took it over for a little while in the interim while we were hiring for that position. And we have about, I don't know, what is it, about six or eight projects, Joe, that are within that predator plan currently. Joe is overseeing that program. So there's six projects. So that breakdown that Sean alluded to last year, the 64 versus 36% equated to about 722,000 lethally and about 372,000 HRM. And those six projects, we, you know, there are some specific projects such as Project 40, which is now transitioning to Area 13, which would be lion and coyote removal. But a lot of it's more statewide driven, you know, where we're responding to needs. Say you have a lower bighorn sheep population where you have collar mortality. You may go remove individuals there.

Or you've got meal dare enhancement program projects, Project 47, where we identified lion removal in Area 12 and 11. Like it's, it's all over the map. So that's where your funding's going from everything from raver removal for the protection of sage grouse to lion removal statewide to coyote lion removal to even our turkey applications where we have mesopred or removal, like at our wildlife management areas, such as coyotes, skunks, bobcats, so on, so forth. So it, uh, I do manage that program now and I'm starting to embark on what FY 26 is going to look like. We'll finalize that at the next commission meeting, but it's, uh, yeah, it's going to be undergoing a transition with assembly bill 70. I like the word removal. I think Joe, let's keep that up. Let's keep this removal word going, remove all predators. How's that? I don't know if that's realistic.

And that's probably not the proper thing to say, but, but, uh, anyway, it sounds like, it sounds like you're working hard on it.

You catch. Yeah. It's a lot to keep up with, especially from a, from a mountain lion standpoint, it's quite a bit. Um, we're pretty aggressive with, uh, with lions, um, that as Joe mentioned, as they take, uh, pollard bighorn sheep, you know, especially. Um, or use that are basically disease freeze and producers. Um, we try and reduce that, uh, mortality rate by removing those lions on the landscape. Um, and then even within, uh, you know, our, our, our birds that undergo some sort of disease event. Uh, we try to get a little bit more aggressive with mountain lions to provide big horn with a chance. Uh, we've even, um, got a little bit more aggressive with lions in places like, uh, the still waters and the clan Alpines post wild horse removal. Uh, the BLM removed 3000 horses from that 182, 183 sort of clan Alpine still water complex.

And so we got a little bit concerned that prey switching might be something that would occur as they move, as those lions moved away from horses on the landscape and transition back to desert bighorn. Um, so we got a little bit more aggressive with bighorn in those two mountain ranges. So, um, and then Joe mentioned the projects we've done with, uh, some of the, like, hunt unit one, two, one. Uh, we got pretty aggressive with mountain lions in that particular unit this year, as well as, uh, one 12, one 13. So, um, there's been, there's been work, but it is, you know, it's money intensive, it's time intensive. And so there's some limiting factors there. Yeah. Uh, when you start conducting predator control. You really have to be strategic about it. And, you know, you kind of cut with the scalpel as much as you can, rather than move in with a chainsaw and trying to do everything all at once.

Like, thanks. So, so. Makes sense. Yeah. And one thing I'll add to your listeners, um, for your listeners is where we're going to be either reintroducing sheep or translocating sheep. We will conduct pre and post treatment line removal in those areas. We actually have non-governmental organization funding and law sportsmen willing to help. So it's in our big game release plan that we'll conduct that work. So starting about mid May until mid June. And then a little bit after, because a lot of these animals are going to be collared. We'll be conducting that work as well. Okay. Right on. All right, guys. Well, it's been a long go. So our podcast is probably the longest one we've done in three or four years. It's an hour and 50 minutes or plus. It's a long time for me. I need a nap, Bronson. I don't know. It's just part. Anyway, but, uh, appreciate you guys being on.

Sean, Scott, Joe, you guys are awesome. Of course, I wish we could talk to all of them. I, you know, Salisbury, Jason, he's always fun to visit with and very intense. So there's a number of you guys. I like, I like y'all. And, and Bronson and I, Devin, we've dealt with most of you. And so anyway, we appreciate you guys being willing to, to work with us as non-residents. Um, and, uh, and we, and we like covering the state. We talk about a lot here at Epic Outdoors. Help guys apply. Anybody out there listening, you're welcome to call in and visit with Adam or I or Devin, Wyatt, Josh, any of us. And, and we'll go over some, some of your options as non-residents. Again, EpicOutdoors.com, 435-263-0777. Uh, again, guys, you're awesome. Appreciate you. Keep up all the hard work. It is hard. It is hard, you know, and you can't please everybody.

And, and I like to tease you about the extreme trophy and that is, uh, doesn't pertain to most people. We, we also need to be able to hunt over the course of our life. So we can't just offer three tags in every unit like I might want. But, but anyway, uh, sure. Appreciate you guys in, in balancing that with all species. And it's been very informative. This is the, probably the most informative podcast we've ever done. And, and I appreciate you augering through it with us. Uh, it's been fun. Actually, I've been very, I've been engaged myself. I'm staring at the screen. We're looking at these guys. Well, you know, it's just learning a lot. And, and so in a state that we love. And a lot of positive stuff. That's what's exciting. Yeah. Right. Ready to go apply. I mean, I'm already applied. Couldn't wipe the grins off our faces over antelope.

And it's not my most favorite thing in the world, but geez, I'm ready to kill about five of them. You lit up more on antelope and moose than I think maybe even deer today. You're pretty excited about those. I mean, it is state of the nation for deer west wide is tough, not just in Nevada. And so, you know, yeah, sometimes you do look at other species and then when deer are good, you go back to them, but I don't know. You can't seem to leave them. So anyway, but again, appreciate you guys. Sean, Scott, Joe, you guys are awesome. Thanks for your time today. Thanks a lot, guys. Appreciate it. Yeah. Thanks. Yeah. Thank you. Good luck in the draw. All right. Thank you. Okay. Hey, everybody. Logan, are you applied yet? There we have it. Logan, you got until May 7. You're in? I'm in. You're in? All right. We're set. I'm in, but it's a placeholder. I can plug and play. I can change.

Jason Carter taught me something. He said you apply early. That way, if you end up breaking your leg or hospitalized. Yes. Well, my biggest fear. You're in. It's something. My biggest fear is that I'm going to be in the hospital and I won't be able to tell Jana to get me applied. You go into a coma for three weeks and wake up and go. Jana, did you apply me for AdLong? I've got to be behind a point. You know? I mean, this is probably my biggest fear. And I don't know. Is that weird? Well, you could get in a car wreck or something and be in the hospital for a week. But I know I'm going to come out of it. I'm going to be ticked that I don't have a tag or at least I'm not in the draw. So, anyway, apply early. And then you can also go in and plug and play. Free amending. Free amending. Free amending. I amended my app today. You did? Now, after this conversation, you go back in?

Well, I just got to thinking about something. I said, that's not going to work with my schedule. I went in and changed it. Really? Yes. How come you didn't ask Bronson and I for any opinions or, I mean, feel bad about it? I felt pretty confident in my choice. What was your choice? I went from a muzzle to something else. In what species? Maybe archery? No. Yeah, muzzle's not going to work good based on what's going on in the United States. Hunters are so secretive. Devin's the worst, too. Oh, you're so full of that. Oh, anyway. Whatever. Whatever you do, what Devin does. What's that? D-W- That's why. You don't want to do it. I do half the time. D-W-D-D. Do what Devin does? No. All right. Well, anyway, it's been a fun conversation. So, everybody, you got until May 7. Get your apps in.

Let's face it. If your goal is to kill big stuff, you need to draw quality tags. Quality tags are typically hard to draw. To increase your odds of drawing good tags, you need to apply in multiple states. That's where an Epic Outdoors membership can help. For only $150 a year, you get access to our consultants, our online tools, and to Epic approved outfitters and members-only optics discounts. With unlimited access to our team of consultants and access to the Epic Outdoors magazines, applying in multiple states is easy. No more worrying if you're applying for the best areas. No more applying for a unit where there has been a die-off. And no more missing opportunities where you could be in the field and not sitting at home. Go online at epicoutdoors.com or call us today at 435-263-0777 to find out how you can become a member today. Kuyu is the most uncompromising camo on the market.

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