Colorado wildlife meeting Tuesday in Grand Junction

Colorado Parks and Wildlife invites the public to a meeting with agency officials on Tuesday evening, Aug. 16, in Grand Junction to discuss the predator management plan in the Piceance Basin.

Due to a variety of factors, among them habitat fragmentation, disease development, increased outdoor recreation and predation, mule deer populations remain below intended levels in parts of the state. To reverse the downward trend, CPW managers continue to implement the agency’s West Slope Mule Deer Strategy, which was approved by the CPW Commission last year.

One component of the strategy is a three-year monitoring study for predator control on the Roan Plateau starting in 2017. More details on this action plan will be available at Tuesday’s 6 p.m. meeting at the South Hall of the Garfield County Fairgrounds.

“We remain well below where we would like to be in terms of overall mule deer numbers,” Ron Velarde, CPW northwest regional manager, said in a news release. “There is no one reason and no ‘silver bullet’ solution to this problem, but many in the public identified predator management as one factor that could yield positive results, and we agree.”

For more information about Colorado’s mule deer strategy, visit: http://www.cpw.state.co.us/learn/Pages/CO-WestSlopeMuleDeerStrategySummit.aspx.