Landscape simulation of foraging by elk, mule deer, and cattle on summer range.

Abstract

Cattle, mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) and elk (Cervus elaphus) share more area of spring, summer and fall range than any other combination of wild and domestic ungulates in western North America (Wisdom and Thomas 1996). Not surprisingly, conflicts over perceived competition for forage have a long history, yet knowledge about actual competition is limited (Van Dyne et al. 1984b, Hobbs et al. 1996, Johnson et al. 1996). One of the first studies of the Starkey Project was designed to address the issue of whether mule deer and elk compete with cattle for available forage on summer range. A component of this study was to build a forage allocation model that could be used to analyze forage allocation problems on summer range in the Blue Mountains. This model would use data on animal spatial distributions, resource selection patterns, behavioral interactions and diet selection of cattle, elk and mule deer that was collected as part of the Starkey Project at the Starkey Experimental Forest and Range (Starkey) (Johnson et al. 2000; Coe et al. 2001,2004; Findholt et al. 2004).