# Mulies and Whitetails, can they co-exist?



## #1DEER 1-I (Sep 3, 2009)

As a person from Utah, it is estimated that in Northeastern Utah (and spreading further every year) there is a population of around 1,000 as of 2008. My question is to those who live in states with both whitetails and mulies or those who have a good opinion on it, can the mule deer survive and prosper when its close more disease resistant, higher reproductive rates, and more aggressive breeding cousin stops in to stay forever? I've heard good and bad with whitetails and mule deer living in the same area, but it has been from people who have never experienced what actually happens.

As a personal opinion Utahs mule deer herd is holding on by a slim margin and is stressed to a breaking point, partly because of bad conservation by the DWR but would whitetail in Utah take pressure off mule deer (hunting wise) or would they put so much on mule deer that the mule deer would begin to thin out and the whitetail would be the deer that lived on while the mule deer's range kept being pushed further west and smaller while the whitetails range pushed further west and grew larger?

I would just hate to see the mule deer go, but it seems like the whitetail may very well one day in the future take over from coast to coast and the mule deer will become a distant memory?

What's your opinion, do whitetails and mule deer mix well? Or will the whitetail out compete the mule deer to and extent that would devastate it?


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## ando_31 (Sep 15, 2009)

I hunt in an area with an approximate 50/50 ratio of muleys to whitetails. I rarely see them heard up together or feed right next to each other, but I have yet to see one species push the other one out. Oddly enough its not the muleys that are moving into the whitetail prairie, but the whitetail moving into the badlands. I mostly bow hunt as it is very difficult to draw a muley buck rifle tag in ND. During some of our pushes I've seen muleys running with whitetail while using the same escape routes. At least in the area I hunt the two species coexist without much of a problem. There is a disease that the whitetails catch from time to time that virtually kills off the whole heard, but that disease doesn't affect the muleys for reasons beyond my knowledge.

Its hard to say if the whitetails will slim down the hunting pressure on the muleys. In ND you have to specify which species you're applying for in the lottery system for rifle season so the muley population and whitetail population are managed separately. I don't know how Utah's licenses work, but one could assume that if the whitetails are moving into the muley country and you didn't have to specify which species to hunt that the whitetails will take off at least a bit of pressure. Errr, I mean the pressure will be the same but some people won't care whether they come home with a whitetail vs a muley.

My father told me that years ago the only place you found muleys was in the badlands and the only place you found the whitetails was in the prairie/flatlands. He never saw the animals together nor did he expect to see them on each others turf. When I was young it seemed that the muleys were moving into the prairie lands and field lands. The whitetail population had taken a big hit during the first number of years during my hunting career so I never saw much for whitetail at all. Now both species are prospering and their turf is completely overlapping without problem. You're still a bit more likely to see muleys in "muley country" and whitetails in "whitetail country", but I'm not surprised anymore when I crest a butte only to have a giant whitetail bust out below me and run the buttes like a muley....or when I walk a coulee on flatland surrounded by fields and have a muley fly down the bottom searching for the best topographic terrain to escape through.

Another topic is crossbreeding. I have yet to see a definitive case of crossbreeding in the area I hunt though I'm sure it happens from time to time. I'm not sure how the crossbreeding affects the deer herds, but chances are that is doesn't do them any good.

In short, I love the ability to hunt both species at the same time with my bow. Its a thrill when I jump what looks like a nice looking muley buck and find out that its a giant whitetail when I get my binos on him. I consider myself to be a muley hunter first and whitetail second, but I've seen a few whitetail recently that I would much rather have on my wall than most of the muleys I've come across. Giant whitetail, giant muley....I don't care which runs in front of me as long as Giant precedes the species name.


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## barebackjack (Sep 5, 2006)

The short answer is yes.

However, the whitetail is DEFINITELY encroaching on the mulies habitat, and whitetails are more aggressive breeders. They CAN interbreed, and with whitetails being more aggressive in that department, well, you do the math.


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## alleyyooper (Jul 6, 2007)

Because they do interbreed, in some states they are much sought as the cross breeds seem to get bigger.

 Al


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## stonebroke (Dec 16, 2004)

Whitetails and Mule Deer co-exist in many states and provinces. Around northcentral Montana it's common to see both species feeding in a field, but they tend to stay in their own groups..... Mulies will be feeding together in one portion of a field and whitetails will be in another.

They do interbreed, but it's not common. Keep in mind that today's Mule Deer is actually a cross between whitetails and blacktails which took place thousands of years ago. From what I've read this has been determined by studying DNA samples.

Populations tend to shift over time... Whitetails have been expanding their range for a long time, but I've also seen Mule Deer start showing up here in the Milk River Valley in larger and larger numbers over the past 20 years or so.


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## verg (Aug 21, 2006)

I saw first hand a muley/whitetail cross. Here in SD we have east river and west river licenses. Whitetail abound on both sides of the river with mulies mostly on the west side. (Missouri River that is) I hunt deer on both sides. A few seasons back as we drove a long driveway to talk to a rancher there were several deer laying in his trees..one a tad odd looking. We glassed him from about 100 yds is all. I guess I don't have dna proof but it would be pretty hard to prove my thoughts wrong. Had mule deer face/ears with whitetail rack. A mixed coloration of body meaning had characteristics of both. Was bedded so couldn't see tail. Looked to be quite large. I would have loved to get a poke at him.


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## MuleyMan (Mar 1, 2007)

White tails and mule deer do hybridize from time to time all though it is not all that common. There are a few papers published in the Journal of Wildlife Management concerning DNA analysis to determine how frequently white tails/mule/and black tailed deer interbreed in their respective overlapping ranges and whether mule deer were a hybrid of a black/white tail cross. If I remember correctly there was nothing definitively decided to conclusively state that mulies are a hybrid species (white x black tail).

The disease that can substantially reduce white tail populations across much of the west is called Epizootic Hemorhagic Disease (EHD). It is an insect borne disease which causes cerebral swelling and fever, and only in rare occasions will white tails recover from it. This disease is mostly white tail exclusive; however, in extreme cases it has also been documented in mule deer and antelope as well.

MM


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## crosshunt (Feb 10, 2009)

here in idaho we have mulies in the south and white tails in the north. there doesnt seem to be any problem with them coexisting for the white tails stay in their area and the mulies stay in theirs. but since white tails are more aggresive breeders there will usually be a longer season for them than the mulies just to keep the population under control. EXAMPLE: in most of idaho you can hunt mule deer buck only with rifle for about 3-4 weeks, where with white tails its any sex with rifle for right under 2 months.


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## verg (Aug 21, 2006)

Muleyman,
you seem like you might be a bit more versed on diseases etc than most??

Well, I hunted perkins co. for years and a couple times the numbers on the ranch for whitetails were very low. Ranchers had told us that they had found many bones piles etc and that they died from "blue tongue."
I have heard of this disease for years but I guess I don't actually know what it is. Do you or anyone else know specifics of it?
I believe it is more indicitive of whitetails.


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## HUNTNFISHND (Mar 16, 2004)

verg said:


> Muleyman,
> you seem like you might be a bit more versed on diseases etc than most??
> 
> Well, I hunted perkins co. for years and a couple times the numbers on the ranch for whitetails were very low. Ranchers had told us that they had found many bones piles etc and that they died from "blue tongue."
> ...


Blue Tongue is very similar to EHD. It's a viral infection that's fatal to deer, mainly whitetails.


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