History
Fish and Game's Upper Snake Region has significant history of winter feeding and has an active Winter Feeding Advisory Committee. The Henry Creek Fire burned over 50,000 acres in the summer of 2016, including over 30,000 acres of the Tex Creek Wildlife Management Area. Tex Creek WMA provides significant winter range for about 4,000 elk and 4,000 mule deer. The winter range on Tex Creek is critical for the maintenance of those herds and the hunting opportunity they provide across eastern Idaho and serves to keep the majority of those herds from depredating on nearby private agricultural ground.
Shortly after the Henry Creek Fire, Fish and Game began preparing plans to mitigate the loss of critical winter range including: habitat restoration, expanded harvest opportunity, planting of lure crops and a large winter feeding program. Fish and Game staff consulted with the Upper Snake Winter Feeding Advisory Committee, private land owners surrounding the Tex Creek WMA and the hunting public when planning actions to respond to the loss of critical winter range.
The loss of natural forage from the fire is not expected to cause significant nutritional based mortality to the elk herd, but will primarily impact elk behavior resulting in significant numbers of elk moving onto surrounding agriculture fields. Winter feeding of elk is primarily designed to keep elk on the feeding operations and reduce elk depredations on surrounding agricultural fields.
Winter feeding of mule deer is intended to provide a nutritional substitute for lost natural forage and prevent significant losses to the herd. A short term reduction in the wintering mule deer within the fire scar might be a benefit to habitat recovery, and the overall health of this segment of the mule deer population. Staff expects some level of mortality to the wintering deer population within the area impacted by the fire.
Upper Snake regional staff bought and positioned 2,000 tons of dairy-quality hay in September in preparation for feeding operations in the winter of 2016-17. Feeding commenced on December 4 and has continued uninterrupted. Three Fish and Game employees spend 100-percent of their time on the feeding operation.
Feb. 6, 2017 status report
Daily feeding of approximately 4,000 elk at Tex Creek WMA. Deer remain scattered and not on the feeding area.
Daily feeding of approximately 200 mule deer at Henry Creek site. These deer were displaced by the Tex Creek fire. Site is located southeast of Idaho Falls.
Efforts are underway to prevent more than 200 antelope from frequenting Highway 33 and Highway 20-26 near Arco. We are working with BLM, ITD, and the INL to plow arterial roads from these highways to allow antelope easier passage in this area. If this effort does not keep antelope off of the highway, then measures will be taken to feed on these arterial roads.
We currently have at least 45 on-going depredation properties we are working with. To date we have responded to 116 big game depredation issues this winter. Most officers and biologists have each been assigned as the point person for one of the depredation issues.