Abstract - Richard F Bliss III - Home

BUD BLISS, RICHARD COLLEY, BROCK DAUGHTRY BSEN 5220 FINAL PROJECT

WHITETAIL DEER HABITAT ANALYSIS DECEMBER 2, 2015

Abstract

Odocoileus virginiaus, commonly known as the whitetail deer, has been hunted for sport and survival for many years. In Alabama, deer harvesting records have been kept for an extended period of time. This report provides an analysis of overall whitetail deer habitat and harvesting records in the state of Alabama for 2011. The maps of hospitable land were then overlain on to the map containing the deer harvest records to see which areas are most apt to produce high deer populations. It was determined that the land with the highest deer inhabitance probability coincided with the areas possessing the highest harvest numbers. The county found to have the most productive hunting area was Clay County at 42% of the total land mass. From our findings, it could be considered accurate to assume that the areas highlighted by our final raster file have a higher probability producing trophy whitetail deer.

Introduction Methods and Procedures Results and Discussion Data Concerns Conclusion References

Table of Contents

Appendix 1: Alabama Land Use raster Favorable Alabama Land Use Rasters Alabama Tree Canopy Cover Alabama LANDFIRE Data Favorable Habitat for State of Alabama 2011 Deer Harvest Data per County Final Alabama Favorable Hunting Environments Map Favorable Environment and Harvest Data Overlay Clay County Aerial Image Clay County Favorable Hunting Locations Urban Centers Overlay Alabama GAP Project Habitat Map

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3 3 6 7 7 8

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

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Introduction: The purpose of this project was to determine ideal places to hunt in the state of Alabama.

Whitetail Deer hunting is a method of both fun and survival for many families across this state, and even for students attending Auburn University. By knowing the areas that produce the most Whitetail Deer, hunters can save time and resources making them more efficient at their craft. Our analysis of the state of Alabama produces raster file consisting of the ideal places to hunt.

The habitat for whitetail deer in Alabama consists of various herbaceous environments. The optimum environment consists of tree canopy coverage, sufficient brush for both food and camouflage, a source of water, and significant distance from highly urbanized areas. This report provides an analysis of the many areas within Alabama that provide any type of habitable land and then divides those areas into optimal habitats for Whitetail Deer. This data was then compared with state wide harvesting records from 2011 in order to determine how strong the correlation was between the data. Our goal through this project was to provide an easily interpreted map to give an individual interested in hunting a ball park idea of highly productive hunting regions. Methods and Procedures:

For this laboratory analysis, GIS data of land use, tree canopy, and county outlines were collected from the National Land Cover Database (NLCD), Alabama View, and other sources. Alabama whitetail deer harvesting records, aerial imagery, and information about deer habitat were all collected for use in ArcMap. Within ArcMap, these maps were converted to the NAD 1983 UTM Zone 16N projection to ensure accuracy and compatibility between files. The habitable land raster found on page 5 of Appendix 1, consists of factors of: land use (Appendix 1: page 1), tree canopy and LANDFIRE data.

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The land use maps were reclassified with values related to the level of hospitability of that specific raster cell. Cells with highly hospitable land were given a value of two, areas that were slightly less habitable were assigned a value of one and inhabitable cells were given a value of zero. This reclassified land use raster (Appendix 1: page 2) was a component of the final multiplication map, which indicates the best habitat for deer in Alabama.

Tree canopy data (Appendix 1: page 3) was obtained from the USGS "National Map" data collection, this data was provided in three separate zones for Alabama. This provided a challenge because it had to be accurately be combined using the "Combine" tool under the "Spatial Analyst" tab. This data was then extracted through the mask of the "Counties Layer" obtained from the Alabama View Website. Tree canopy raster values are expressed in terms of percent coverage, with 100% being full canopy coverage. Values from 1-100% were implemented into the final multiplication raster, because habitable areas for deer typically have more canopy coverage. However, sometimes land use rasters and tree canopy data can occasionally be misleading, for this reason we employed data from the LANDFIRE program.

The LANDFIRE program provides a raster data file with more specific land use assignments than the standard data files. This data was incorporated in order to ensure areas with misleading tree canopy and land use values would not be included in the final multiplication raster. For example, small one acre parks in a highly urbanized areas may possess favorable tree canopy environments, and "Mixed Forest" land use values, but would be highly unfavorable for hunting. Favorable values from the LANDFIRE file were selected and reassigned to a value of 1; while other cells such as "Urban Herbaceous" cells were assigned a value of zero (Appendix 1: page 4). By making this file one of the three major components of our final multiplication file, a method of differentiation from misleading land use and tree canopy values was obtained.

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Finally, our multiplied raster (Appendix 1: page 5), consisting of filtered land use, tree canopy, and LANDFIRE data, was multiplied by Whitetail Deer harvest data (Appendix 1: page 6). These harvest totals were obtained from a mail survey taken from 3,097 licensed hunters across the state of Alabama; this data did not include hunters who hunt only on private property or those who hunt illegally. The data was projected for the total number of officially licensed hunters in the state amounting to a state harvest total of 150,000 kills with 2.3% error. For our analysis, this data when parceled into countywide areas was sufficient for the estimates we desired.

Once the multiplication raster was combined with the per-county harvest data, the result was a Final Whitetail Habitat Analysis map (Appendix 1: page 7). Raster cells in this data set ranged in value from 0 ? 200; with the higher numbers being more favorable places to hunt. A raster calculation was performed to restrict the cell values to greater than 185; this allowed a reasonable amount of area to be displayed throughout the state. This raster was placed on top of the deer harvest map for better visibility on the 8th page of Appendix 1.

After the conclusion that Clay County (aerial in Appendix 1: page 9) possessed the highest percentage of favorable hunting land, the Final Whitetail Habitat Analysis raster was extracted through the mask of the county's shapefile (Appendix 1: page 10). For a final comparison of Urbanized areas, an Urbanization shapefile was obtained from the Alabama View website and was overlain on the Final Whitetail Analysis raster (Appendix 1: page 11). For further discussion and comparison, results for Whitetail Deer habitat areas from the Southeast Regional GAP Analysis Project were included in page 12 of Appendix 1.

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