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The remainder of the base, which lies east of I-95, is divided into 2 sections known as OCS and Mainside. Officers Candidate School (OCS) is not heavily developed but it contains 3 small, heavily used training areas. Hunting programs were started in 1987 (archery) and 1990 (shotgun).
Mainside is a highly developed area comprising just over 4700 acres. It contains housing, schools, riding stables, a golf course, commissary, and many other buildings. Because of this concentration of development, Mainside has the highest volume of traffic.In the late 1980’s, conflicts between the increasing traffic volume on Mainside and the increasing deer population became intolerable. Biologists now have a term called Cultural Carrying Capacity (CCC) which is an attempt to define the point at which the deer population begins to have an intolerable effect on the human population. In developed areas, the CCC is usually exceeded before the BCC. In 1991, 20% of the total vehicle accidents reported on Mainside involved a deer/vehicle collision.
One of the Federal Game Wardens who enforce the hunting regulations on the base related an incident that shows just how dangerous deer/vehicle collisions are. A woman with young children was driving on base. As she drove down a section of road that parallels a steep embankment, a deer jumped off the embankment and came through the roof of her car. The deer, disoriented and frightened by the experience, thrashed and kicked. The woman received several lacerations. The happy ending to this incident is that no one was seriously injured. Had the deer landed a fraction of a second later, the thrashing animal could have seriously injured the children. In addition to the risk to life and limb, property damage from deer/vehicle accidents can be significant. This Game Warden indicated that even with the strict enforcement of low speed limits on Mainside, he believes that an estimate of $1000.00 per deer/vehicle collision is a very conservative estimate for vehicle damage.
The Chief of Staff requested that deer be live-trapped and relocated west of I-95 on base. This alternative proved to be prohibitively expensive and logistically impractical. The NREA Branch and VDGIF recommended a well-regulated recreational archery hunting program.
The base was reluctant to implement a hunting program at first. There were safety concerns; Mainside is criss-crossed with trails that are used by horseback riders, ATV riders, joggers, and residents from the housing areas. Since the speed limits on Mainside are relatively low and strictly enforced, the risks from Deer/vehicle collisions were primarily property damage rather than loss of life. Two new concerns resulting from the increasing deer population were added to the equation, Lyme disease and habitat reduction for forest vertebrates.
After investigating hunting programs at other Department of Defense installation having urban conditions similar to those at Mainside, the base started an archery program in 1992. Fort Belvoir in Virginia, and Patuxent River Naval Air Station in Maryland, both had well-established archery hunting programs that served as examples. An archery program was selected because it is quiet, it is conducted from elevated stands with a short range weapon, and because these model programs have been safely conducted in urbanized situations and have been effective in achieving a satisfactory deer harvest.
The Mainside Archery Program
In order to participate in
the Mainside Archery Program, a hunter must first be a qualified hunter on Quantico. Each
Quantico hunter is required to hold a valid Virginia state hunting license, attend a
Quantico MCB safety lecture, and purchase a base hunting license. Further Mainside
administrative requirements include possessing a valid Virginia State Big Game hunting
license, and archery license. Then, each hunter must attend a special Mainside specific
safety training orientation and pass an archery skills qualification. The orientation
ensures that each bowhunter is familiar with all of the special rules and consideration
associated with hunting in urbanized areas. The shooting qualifications have changed as
the program has matured. Initially, bowhunters were required to place 3 out of 5 arrows in
a 9" circle at both 20 and 30 yards using field points. In subsequent years,
candidates were required to perform the test from an elevated shooting location to more
realistically represent the field conditions. Now, archers are required to complete the
test with the targets placed at unknown distances, once again to more accurately represent
field conditions.
Once qualified, the bowhunters must adhere to strict rules including:
Recently, a VDGIF biologist for northern Virginia spoke at a Belvoir Bowhunters meeting. He said that anytime harvest statistics show female deer harvests above 50%, the population is moving in the right direction. Notice that in most years, Mainside hunting harvests exceed the 50% level (Figure 1). Clearly this is only one measure of the effectiveness of a bowhunting program. It presupposes many factors including the size of the total harvest relative to the estimated total population. Although removing male deer from the population has the same effect as removing female deer on the current herd size, removing female deer has a significantly greater effect on the population in subsequent years. Since the primary objective was to reduce deer/vehicle collisions, perhaps the best measure of success would be to examine the deer/vehicle collision rate as a function of the traffic density over time. Although that level of data is not available, simply examining deer/vehicle collision rates over time provides some insight into the effectiveness of the program. Figure 2 compares two time periods of data:
The data is annualized so the fact that the early period covers three years and the latter period covers two years is immaterial. Notice that in general, the number of accidents decreased significantly. Of course, many factors could contribute to this decrease but the hunting program probably contributes heavily. My personal experience on this Base indicates that traffic densities have certainly not decreased during this period. Speed limits on these roads have always been rigorously enforced. It is unlikely that changes in road usage contribute significantly to the decrease. One might think that the natural swings in the deer populations might account for the decrease. Figure 3 compares this Mainside reduction to the reduction on the Guadalcanal side of base where gun hunting has been used for many years to manage deer herds. Mainside reductions were significant while the reductions on the Guadalcanal side of base were nominal. In fact, the reduction in deer/vehicle collisions on Mainside was over 18 times greater per mile than on the roads to the west of I-95 during the same time period. This indicates that natural population swings probably contributed little to the reduction. Also, there were no known catastrophic events, or diseases that were unique to the Mainside area during that timeframe. This suggests that the Mainside bowhunting was probably the largest contributor to the reduced deer/vehicle collisions.
One final metric that could be used to determine success is the estimated deer population growth on Mainside. Techniques for such population estimates like track counts and spotlight surveys have a significant random error component. Therefore, they require a large sample size to have statistical significance. Furthermore, the effectiveness of these measurement techniques varies with habitat. These techniques are probably best used to measure relative population trends rather than to estimate absolute population sizes. Since spotlight surveys were not conducted on Mainside prior to 1992, there is insufficient data to make a definitive statement about how population trends have been affected by the Mainside bowhunting program.
There have been very few incidents between hunters and residents or non-hunting public since the program began. The Game Wardens only rarely get a call from residents reporting that they have seen a hunter in the woods. This is a tribute to the low profile nature of the program. Most residents on Mainside are not even aware that a regulated hunting program is being conducted. There has been only one report of wounded deer dying in residential or public area. This was the most serious incident reported. It occurred when a hunter tracked a deer to a section of woods near a residence. Just as the hunter saw the expired deer, he saw a resident walking toward it. The hunter, apparently thinking that the resident wanted to claim the deer, began shouting at the resident to stay away from "his" deer. This kind of behavior is totally unacceptable. The individual was disciplined and hunter ethics and residence relations are now emphasized in the annual Mainside orientation.
Quantico has an extensive Conservation Volunteer Program that allows hunters to volunteer time to help the Fish Wildlife and Agronomy Section manage the training areas. One of these volunteers is also certified by VDGIF to teach the state hunter safety course. This volunteer has presented the Mainside Orientation each year. I asked both him and the Game Wardens what the biggest risks were with the Mainside program. Both agreed that there are two areas of hunter ethics where constant vigilance is required. The first is shot selection and the second is residence relations. A hunter who might otherwise pass up a shot as too risky might think that because the deer have become a problem it is okay to take the risky shot. Shot selection is one of the topics that is stressed in the orientation to combat this kind of attitude. The second risk area is residence relations. Hunters need to view themselves as guests on Mainside. They need to recognize that some residents may not be fully informed about hunting and that others simply object to hunting. It is important that hunters avoid conflict with residents. When contact is unavoidable each hunter must be pleasant, explain that hunting is authorized and show a hunting pass. If a complaint arises, the hunter must walk away and let the authorities address the situation.
Suburban Whitetail Management of Northern Virginia (SWMNV) is a new non-profit corporation established to help manage the Whitetail deer populations in Fairfax, Loudoun, and Prince William counties by placing highly qualified ethical bowhunters on private properties. Several of the SWMNV architects are participants in the Quantico Mainside bowhunting program. I personally have participated in the program since 1993. The Mainside program was examined closely and provided a great model for the SWMNV program.
There are some differences between the hunting environment most often encountered in the northern Virginia suburbs and on Quantico Mainside. Mainside has some good size wooded tracts between highly developed areas. This allows for a sizable "buffer zone" to be established between the hunting areas and the residences. This is not possible when hunting on a 5 or 10 acre parcel in the suburbs. The hunting area on Mainside is shared with joggers, horseback riders, and others. In this respect, Quantico Mainside is similar to hunting a small park in the middle of the suburbs. Secondly, Quantico has a full time biologist and several Federal Game Wardens to provide monitoring and enforcement. Finally, although the culture on a military base today has significant more diversity of views and opinions that it did just 20 years ago, the diversity of culture in the suburbs of northern Virginia is significantly greater.
The Suburban Whitetail Management bowhunting program has borrowed many of the elements of the Mainside program. The idea of shooting proficiency testing was borrowed from military base programs. Because of the small hunting parcel sizes in the suburbs, it is important that harvest animals are recovered as close as possible to the hunter’s tree stand. Instead of using a 9" target for shooting proficiency testing, SWMNV uses a 6" target. This is intended to provide a margin of error that will ensure a quick clean harvest even when conditions are less than optimal. The Mainside program relies heavily on an annual lecture enumerating the rules and stressing bowhunting ethics as well as resident relations. Similarly, SWMNV has developed an extensive New Member Orientation that addresses similar topics. Additionally, SWMNV requires bowhunters to complete the International Bowhunters Education Program (IBEP) course that focuses on the ethics of bowhunting and shot selection. The Mainside program is authorized under the VDGIF DMAP program. This program defines the requirements for the collection and reporting of biological data. The small size of most northern Virginia parcels makes DMAP unsuitable in most circumstances. Suburban Whitetail Management has been working with VDGIF biologists to perform voluntary collection of biological data similar to that collected for DMAP.
All in all, the Quantico Mainside bowhunting program has been both safe and effective. Suburban Whitetail Management of Northern Virginia has relied heavily on this program in designing the SWMNV bowhunting program.
| Editing Note: This article was written by Jack Yoder, webmaster for Suburban Whitetail Management of Northern Virginia Inc. Information for this article was gathered with the generous support of the Natural Resources and Environmental Affairs Branch at Quantico MCB. Publication of this article was coordinated through and approved by the Public Affairs Branch at Quantico MCB, however, all opinions and conclusions are those of the author and Suburban Whitetail Management of Northern Virginia. |
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