![\"\"](\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/deer2.jpg\" "\\"deer2\\"")
<\/a>Mose Buchele \/ StateImpact Texas<\/p>
This deer may be hungier than usual in the drought.<\/p><\/div>\n
At McBrides Gun\u2019s in Austin, Thomas Hunt is looking for the perfect rifle to take his son Mathew out hunting. The appropriately-named Hunt has already bagged two deer this year. He says the impact of the drought was noticeable right\u00a0away.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe same deer that we saw last year has had bigger horns last year than they had this year,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve had one that was a very large — probably 14 point — that was a 10 point this year. So we\u2019ve seen that much reduction in the horn\u00a0size.\u201d<\/p>\n
Allen Cain, deer program leader with the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, said the legacy of the drought could be with us for\u00a0years.
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\u201cObviously hunters are not harvesting fawns, so it\u2019s not a big impact as far as harvest this year. What\u2019ll happen is you\u2019ll see that impact four or five years down the road,\u201d said Cain.<\/strong><\/p>\n Despite the toll the drought has taken, Cain hopes hunters bring home a lot of deer this year. The reason? As distressed as some deer populations are, Texas\u2019 habitat is in even greater distress, and too many deer foraging in a drought-stricken landscape can severely damage the ecosystem.<\/p>\n \u201cEspecially during drought, it\u2019s likely to do more damage to that habitat which can also impact other species that aren\u2019t hunted like songbirds, to whatever else out there,\u201d said Cain. An uptick in deer hunting would also be good for the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. The Department has seen a drop in revenue as park attendance and fishing licenses have been down dramatically in the drought.<\/p>\n Back at McBrides Gun Shop in Austin, Thomas Hunt says he\u2019s also seen fewer bird hunters this\u00a0year.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think the duck hunting has been as good and all the duck hunting has been pushed to the coast. All the ponds on our place are dry,\u201d said Hunt. If you\u2019re looking for a silver lining, another species that has a seriously negative impact on the land, feral hogs, also appears to be down in the drought.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The worst single-year drought in Texas history has left deer undernourished and, in some cases, dying in greater numbers than before. Many of the deer hunters are bringing home are skinnier than normal and the population of fawns surviving through the summer took a nosedive in many parts of the state. At McBrides Gun\u2019s in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":2325,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[58],"tags":[61,91,90],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2322"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2322"}],"version-history":[{"count":41,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2322\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32709,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2322\/revisions\/32709"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2322"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2322"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2322"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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