Wildlife management practice questions for Alberta

Wildlife management questions

1. 1A winter range is holding far more deer than the available browse can feed through March. What term describes the limit the habitat is setting?

   1. ACarrying capacity
   2. BBag limit
   3. CPopulation density
   4. DHarvest quota
   Show the answer

   ACarrying capacity

   Carrying capacity is the number of animals a habitat can support through its hardest season, which in Alberta is usually late winter. A bag limit is tempting as an answer because it also sounds like a ceiling, but it is a rule written for hunters rather than a property of the land.

2. 2Biologists adjust seasons and quotas from one year to the next. What job does regulated hunting do inside that system?

   1. AIt removes predators from the unit
   2. BIt keeps populations in line with what the habitat can support, using harvest as a lever managers can turn up or down
   3. CIt works toward eliminating a species from an area
   4. DIt guarantees every licence holder an animal
   Show the answer

   BIt keeps populations in line with what the habitat can support, using harvest as a lever managers can turn up or down

   Harvest is one of the few things a manager can change quickly and measure afterward, so it does most of the fine tuning. Guaranteeing success sounds like the point of a season, but seasons are written for the population, not for the hunter.

3. 3Imagine you could spend a budget on one thing to raise the number of upland birds an area supports over the long term. Which choice does the most?

   1. AProtecting and improving the cover, food, and water on the land
   2. BReleasing more pen-raised birds every spring
   3. CShortening the season by a week
   4. DBuilding more access roads into the area
   Show the answer

   AProtecting and improving the cover, food, and water on the land

   Released birds die back to whatever the land can actually hold, so stocking treats the symptom and has to be repeated forever. Habitat sets the ceiling, which is why cover and food outlast every other kind of spending.

4. 4Coyotes are working the same coulee where you hunt mule deer. How should you think about that?

   1. APredators are part of a functioning system, and removing them does not reliably produce more deer
   2. BPredators must be cleared out of any area that is hunted
   3. CCoyotes and mule deer do not share range
   4. DPredators have no effect at all on prey numbers
   Show the answer

   APredators are part of a functioning system, and removing them does not reliably produce more deer

   Predators and prey have shared this country a long time, and habitat and winter severity usually limit deer more than coyotes do. Claiming predators have no effect is the opposite error, and neither extreme matches what managers actually measure.