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Oregon Mule Deer Sumpter Migration Corridors

The Sumpter mule deer herd includes resident and migratory individuals. Mule deer wintering near Oregon Route 244 and La Grande, Oregon, migrate south to Wolf Creek, Glass Hill, and Elkhorn Ridge in spring. Although mixed-conifer forest and ponderosa pine dominate seasonal ranges for these mule deer, winter ranges contain more sagebrush grassland and summer ranges contain more riparian and early shrub-tree habitats. Other mule deer wintering in patches of big sagebrush mixed with conifer, ponderosa pine, western juniper, and quaking aspen forests near North Powder Valley and Powder River also migrate to Elkhorn Ridge for the summer. Some mule deer along Burnt River, where winter ranges are characterized by big sagebrush, western juniper, and grassland, migrate south to areas with more mixed-conifer forest and invasive annual grasses near Monument Rock and Willow Creek in spring. Other mule deer either migrate north or west to Austin, Oregon, and Oregon Route 7, where big sagebrush, mountain big sagebrush, mixed-conifer forest, and ponderosa pine are common. Some of these mule deer travel as far north as Elkhorn Ridge and Wolf Creek. In 2015, the Cornet-Windy fire burned 56,766 acres (22,972 ha) of forested summer range near Oregon Route 245 (BLM, 2023a), improving browse quality but potentially reducing shelter by decreasing canopy cover. Highways are a significant cause of mortality in this area; for example, Interstate 84 had an annual average of 162 DVCs from 2010 to 2022 along a 100-mile (161-km) section (ODOT, 2023). No GPS-collared mule deer successfully crossed Interstate 84 although multiple seasonal ranges and migrations closely bound the highway, indicating a possible loss of historical migration routes. These mapping layers show the location of the migration corridors for mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) in the Sumpter population in Oregon. They were developed from 154 migration sequences collected from a sample size of 53 animals comprising GPS locations collected every 5-13 hours.

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Author(s) Matthew J Kauffman orcid, Blake H Lowrey orcid, Jennifer L McKee orcid, Travis Allen, Chloe Beaupre orcid, Jeffrey Beck orcid, Scott Bergen, Justin Binfet, Shelly Blair, James W Cain orcid, Peyton Carl, Todd Cornish orcid, Michelle Cowardin, Rachel Curtis, Melia DeVivo, Jennifer Diamond, Katie Dugger orcid, Orrin Duvuvuei, C.J. Ellingwood, Darby Finley, Jessica Fort, Eric Freeman, Ian Freeman, Jeff Gagnon, Emily Gelzer orcid, Jacob Gray, Evan Greenspan orcid, Curtis Hendricks, Valerie Hinojoza-Rood, Matt Jeffress, Carolyn Kyle, Zack Lockyer, Cody McKee, Jerod Merkle orcid, Jerrod Merrell, Matt Mumma, Jake Powell, Craig Reddell, Adele Reinking orcid, Robert Ritson, Sierra Robatcek, Benjamin Robb orcid, Brianna Russo orcid, Hall Sawyer orcid, Cody Schroeder, Elissa Slezak, Scott Sprague, Erik Steiner orcid, Alethea Steingisser, Tom Stephenson, Nicole Tatman, Kaitlyn Taylor, Don Whittaker, Travis Zaffarano
Publication Date 2025-02-06
Beginning Date of Data 2015
Ending Date of Data 2023
Data Contact
DOI https://doi.org/10.5066/P1YJCCQA
Citation Kauffman, M.J., Lowrey, B.H., McKee, J.L., Allen, T., Beaupre, C., Beck, J., Bergen, S., Binfet, J., Blair, S., Cain, J.W., Carl, P., Cornish, T., Cowardin, M., Curtis, R., DeVivo, M., Diamond, J., Dugger, K., Duvuvuei, O., Ellingwood, C., Finley, D., Fort, J., Freeman, E., Freeman, I., Gagnon, J., Gelzer, E., Gray, J., Greenspan, E., Hendricks, C., Hinojoza-Rood, V., Jeffress, M., Kyle, C., Lockyer, Z., McKee, C., Merkle, J., Merrell, J., Mumma, M., Powell, J., Reddell, C., Reinking, A., Ritson, R., Robatcek, S., Robb, B., Russo, B., Sawyer, H., Schroeder, C., Slezak, E., Sprague, S., Steiner, E., Steingisser, A., Stephenson, T., Tatman, N., Taylor, K., Whittaker, D., and Zaffarano, T., 2025, Oregon Mule Deer Sumpter Migration Corridors: U.S. Geological Survey data release, https://doi.org/10.5066/P1YJCCQA.
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Metadata Date 2025-02-06
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Harvest Source: ScienceBase
Harvest Date: 2025-02-07T05:07:48.543Z