GREEN RIVER -- The tally was grim.

More than a 100 southwest Wyoming residents helped Wyoming Game and Fish Department personnel survey winter deer mortality in the state's largest mule deer herd in early May, and what they found confirmed fears that a relatively harsh winter took its toll.

The 15th annual mortality surveys for the Wyoming Range mule deer herd were conducted near Cokeville, Pinedale and Big Piney and near Leroy in the Bridger Valley.

Game and Fish biologists said participants counted 313 dead mule deer during the Cokeville, Pinedale and Big Piney surveys.

"That is a record," said survey coordinator Gary Fralick. "This past winter took all age classes."

Officials said an additional 340 dead mule deer were found on the Leroy survey conducted around Mountain View in Uinta County, for a total of 653 dead deer.

The Wyoming Range herd has long been considered the crown jewel of Wyoming's deer herds.

The state's largest deer herd winters on ranges around Pinedale, Big Piney, Kemmerer and Cokeville in Lincoln and Sublette counties. The herd has a huge migration route of about 180 miles that covers eight winter ranges, according to biologists.

The herd basically roams a huge area of western Wyoming that ranges from the Snake River near Jackson on the north, Interstate 80 near Evanston to the south, Green River on the east and the Idaho/Wyoming border on the west.

The herd has numbered around 30,000 animals in recent years, but its population has ranged as high as 57,000 animals in 1990 to a low of an estimated 20,000 deer in 1983. Game and Fish managers have set the herd's population objective at 50,000.

Volunteers scour the countryside during the annual survey looking for dead deer, keeping a close eye out for what age classes of deer were hardest hit by winter conditions.

Fralick said the final count gives the department a sample of winter mortality in the herd, for an indication of overall loss during the past winter.

The survey can also offer some predictions on what the upcoming hunting season might offer mule deer hunters in the Wyoming Range, Greys River and Smiths Fork River areas.

High adult loss

Fralick said perhaps more noteworthy than the 313 dead deer counted were the proportions of the mortality. He said of the dead mule deer counted, 38 percent were adult deer and 58 percent were fawns.

"Any time we see a high percentage of adults in the mortality surveys, we know winter mortality has played a big role in dictating population size for this herd," he said.

"Furthermore, this segment of the Wyoming Range herd has experienced significant winter mortality every two or three years since the 1980s."

Fralick said there's "no doubt the poor habitat conditions on this winter range contributed a great deal" to this year's high death rate.

Game and Fish biologist Jeff Short said there was also a high proportion of adult mule deer mortality among the 340 dead mule deer found during the Leroy survey.

Southwest Wyoming bureau reporter Jeff Gearino can be reached at 307-875-5359 or at gearino@tribcsp.com.