Deer monitoring
Thousand Islands National Park
Parks Canada is collaborating with Trent University on a scientific study into white-tailed deer populations with the Ontario Ministry of Northern Development, Mines, Natural Resources and Forestry. This study will allow Parks Canada to gain valuable information on deer movement and the connectivity the park islands offer for wildlife movement across the St. Lawrence River and major roadways.
Deer populations throughout the Thousand Islands region are very high, but patterns in deer movement across the region are not well understood. Through this study, the partners will develop further understanding of how deer move through this densely populated landscape including Parks Canada administered lands. In February 2022, researchers began will be tagging around a dozen deer with ear tags and GPS tracking collars. This project has since expanded to Grenadier Island and select mainland sites. The aim of the research at Thousand Islands National Park is to learn more about hyper-abundant deer populations, wildlife diseases, movement and ranges, and how wildlife many be moving in response to climate change.
The Thousand Islands are stepping stones that create a corridor for migration between the Adirondacks and Algonquin Park. Learning more about deer movements may also point to how other mammals are moving across this continentally significant ecological corridor.
Parks Canada would like to encourage any member of the public who sees a deer with a tag or collar to report their sighting with us:
Monitoring Deer Movement | Climate Crew | Parks Canada
Transcript
Animated logo introduction sequence: Parks Canada Beaver logo
It can feel like the climate is changing faster than we can react, but there are people doing good work. There is a Climate Crew.
Animated logo sequence: Parks Canada Climate Crew
"Monitoring Deer Movement Thousand Islands National Park
"[Sheldon Lambert is the Resource Conservation Manager at Thousand Islands National Park.]
One of the things we're hoping to learn about deer is how they move through this landscape. This work is critically important to understanding how the home ranges are likely going to change in response to climate change, and how we need to adapt our management practices to better address the impacts of climate change. Management practices are actions such as ecological monitoring, managing wildlife populations, restoring forests, and designing park roads to reduce their impact on wildlife.
[Cassandra approaches the trap, carrying a bucket of feed. She steps inside the trap and begins scattering the feed on the ground to bait the trap.]
The climate crew start by baiting the traps to attract the deer.
[Cassandra continues to pour feed into the trap.]
Let's get this camera up and we can track when the deer moving into the trap.
[Cassandra fastens the camera to the tree trunk and snaps the battery compartment shut.]
[Cassandra Lavigne is a Resource Management Officer at Thousand Islands National Park.]
So that'll send a signal every time there's a deer. Yeah.
[Mathieu Lecompte is a Resource Management Officer at Thousand Islands National Park.]
Anytime there's any activity, it'll send us a photo. Whether it's a deer or any other animal walking by. We'll be able to pick it up and get it sent to our phone or iPad. A unique part of the research that we're doing with Trent University is they have a lot of experience working on wildlife movement, wildlife genetics, and big mammal biology. They're recognized experts in the country.
[Aaron Shafer is an Associate Professor at Trent University.]
So what we do is we put these neat little radio collars
Animated subtitle: GPS Collars (Global Positioning System Collars)
on deer, and they send us a location every two hours. And so we get a really detailed understanding of their movement behaviors and how they're interacting with one another. The collars are programmed to fall off in about two years, but if needed, the team can release them remotely. I think it's just up this way. Collars can be found by the signal they emit, and reprogrammed. Good find! To be used again.
[A member of the Climate Crew Team drives an All Terrain Vehicle (ATV) along a snowy trail.]
The way we handle deer in such a short amount of time without drugs is also less stressful on the animal. And so they're able to recover much quicker. So this eye mask for them keeps them pretty calm. If their eyes are covered, a lot of wild animals will be relaxed like this, which is why we do it.
Cover their ears too just to limit how much external noise they're getting.
Do you want to give me the drop off code? Three Lowercase d. Frequency.
[Stephen Sucharzewski is a master's student in Environmental and Life Sciences at Trent University.]
Hold on. Seven one. Okay. Give me the tape measure.
[The team holds the deer steady while Stephen measures the length of its hind leg.]
It's 25 and a half at the smallest. We do hind foot. It's good overall measure of body size because we can't weight these animals. So we'll measure their hind foot length. And it's just an overall pretty good metrics. 44 and a half. Do we have a hair sample?
Animated subtitle: Tissue and hair samples
From tissue and hair samples, the team can determine the age, health, and genetic traits of the deer. Part of the project with Thousand Islands is getting a sense of how potentially new pathogens or diseases could enter the population of deer in Ontario. Buck fawn color 48. Frequency 171 140. Magnets been removed. Correct. Okay, now we do it in reverse. Yeah.
[The team examines the deer for ticks before preparing to release it back into the wild.]
No ticks. Anytime you guys are ready. Yep. Okay. I'm good. Yep. Three. Two. One. Go! Go! Go! The team encourages the deer to move away quickly so it doesn't focus on the collar. It also allows them to do a visual check on the health of the deer. Excellent job. We'll reset this trap. There's quite a bit of deer in the area, and we'll probably see on the camera deer returning in the next 30 40 minutes. Even with us all being here. The deer just will come back just because of the numbers in this area. So, Aaron, what do you think the emerging patterns that we're seeing are? Yeah, I think there's two clear things that we've seen. It looks like actually most of those deer have left the island at various points. Um hm. The second thing that we've observed is that these deer have very small home ranges, meaning they have a very small area where they spend their time, where they forage. And most of those areas don't overlap. They appear quite segregated.
[A map displaying the tightly clustered home ranges of several tagged deer in Thousand Islands National Park.]
But what's really important to understand is those little home ranges connect together like links of a chain, and those little individual linkages create resilience in a population like white-tail deer. As their home ranges are impacted by climate change, the ability to move to new habitat will help the deer population be more resilient, find food, mates, and diversify the gene pool.
Animated subtitle: Connected lands
Connected lands refers to the ability of wildlife to move between protected places and natural areas. That can happen in a variety of ways, whether it's creating ecological corridors, working with landowners and indigenous communities about how to better protect lands so that forests and wetlands and all the rivers can actually flow together more naturally like they've always done.
Animated subtitle: Wildlife crossing
One of the things we're hoping with this research is combining it together with what we already know about wildlife mortality and roads in the area to help determine the best places to mitigate wildlife mortality by creating wildlife overpasses.
Animated subtitle: Climate Change = Habitat Change
As the climate changes, species like the white-tailed deer will be looking for new home ranges. Monitoring their movement shows how the population is being impacted. And this helps Parks Canada make conservation decisions that will support other species too. So one of the unique things about this park is its incredible biodiversity. We have some of the highest biodiversity of herptiles, of plants, of insects, of any national park in the country. So this work is critically important to understanding how we need to adapt our management practices to better address the impacts of climate change. It's a very privileged experience to be in a cage with a deer and processing it. I'm trusting my team and the deer that we're going to do this well and safely, but just being able to handle a large wild animal is quite special. We're doing meaningful work that I think will inform management, conservation and protection of species. So that's what gives me hope, is seeing my students think about their research in light of climate change. One of the things that I really enjoy working with Parks Canada, is that we're at the forefront of developing understanding about how the ecosystem is responding to climate change. And the work that we're doing is incredibly important because it will influence future decisions. It will be able to allow us to protect the ecosystems and help them adapt to climate change.
"Monitoring Deer Movement Thousand Islands National Park
"Credits:
Series Creators: Karen Hawes and Kim Saltarski
Execcutive Producer, Writer, and Director: Karen Hawes
Producer, Cinematographer, Sound, and Editor: Kim Saltarski
Featuring: Sheldon Lambert, Aaron Shafer, Stephen Sucharzewski, Mathieu Lecompte, Cassandra Lavigne, Thousand Islands National Park, Trent University.
Narrator: Naomi Melvin
Visual Effects, Graphics: Electric Square
Electric Square Project Manager: Karen Suzuki
Animation: Mark Alberts
Additional Footage: Parks Canada, Envato, Trent University
Music: Envato
Special Thanks To: Brooklyn Cars, Sara Baker, Trent University, Thousand Islands National Park, Ontario Ministry of Resources and Forestry, Robert Simmons - Good Dog Digital, Ted Parkes - T-Dot Films, Terry Martindale.
All Parks Canada places are "no drone zones" for recreational use. Please leave your drone at home.
Licensed for use under agreement by Parks Canada.
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This project is funded in part by Parks Canada
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