Why did the Game Commission change from smaller county-based units to larger WMUs for deer management?
First, WMUs were not designed specifically for deer management. They were designed for all wildlife species management programs. Second, it is commonly argued that smaller WMUs are better than large WMUs. This would be true if enough data were collected in each of the small WMU to support management recommendations. Unfortunately, limited time, personnel, and resources combine to prevent adequate data collection at county, or smaller, management units. As a result, larger WMUs were implemented to provide data for making defendable deer management recommendations. The PGC previously combined 67 counties into 31 groups to improve precision of deer-related estimates. Twenty-two WMUs improves precision of and increases confidence in management recommendations within each unit. Third, unlike the 31 county groups, WMUs are created considering land use, land ownership, urbanization, and geography. WMUs are more similar within themselves than they are to other units. County groups were simply
