OCR Text |
Show liriJ It's Your Wildlife I T&l-J 'AMJ Irka, By Garth Carter t. a x a THE DROUGHT AND UTAH UPLAND GAME by Samuel C. Winegardner Game Biologist Division of Wildlife Resources Low precipitation is a common com-mon occurrence in Utah and the state's upland game species spe-cies have adapted to live with arid conditions. However, this year the lack of precipitation has resulted in drought conditions cond-itions that are the worst in recorded history. How will upland game populations respond re-spond to the severe drought conditions? There is no doubt that drought conditions will have a generally adverse affect on upland game populations. Yet the impact w ill be much less upon big game. Upland game populations typically fluctuate widely over time primarily as a result of annual reproduction. reproduc-tion. Reproductive success, on a short-term basis, is principally princi-pally a function of weather conditions, with the most critical time period being late winter and early spring. Weather Wea-ther affects production either through direct impacts on the reproductive process, or indirectly in-directly through forage production. pro-duction. When weather conditions vary from normal or average levels a generally detrimental effect on reproduction can be expected. However, different species are influenced in different dif-ferent ways. Let's review-expected review-expected impacts of drought conditions on various upland game species. Pheasants, mourning dove and hungarian partridge populations pop-ulations have generally fluctuated fluc-tuated independently of late winter and early spring precipitation. pre-cipitation. Spring temperatures tempera-tures appear to be a more critical factor with a warm spring being to the species' advantage. Thus, reproduction reproduc-tion will not necessarily be adversely affected by the drought. Pheasants and mourning dove are generally dependent on croplands and if crops are produced, these two species should not suffer. Obviously, if sufficient cropland crop-land is removed from production produc-tion during a drought there can be an adverse impact. Hungarian partridges, being dependent on natural forage production, will be more adversely ad-versely impacted. Reproductive success of sage grouse, chukar partridge, par-tridge, quail and turkey is |