Migration stopovers of mule deer in the Sheep Creek Range, Nevada

Mule deer in the Sheep Creek sub herd are part of the larger Area 6 herd that occupies portions of Elko, Lander, and Eureka counties. The primary winter range of this population is located along the eastern flank of the Sheep Creek Range and the west side of Boulder Valley. Most deer migrate approximately 30 miles from winter ranges in upper Boulder Creek and Antelope Creek drainages to summer ranges on the west side of the Tuscarora Mountains. However, some deer in this population migrate much farther – approximately 80 miles – and connect with mule deer that summer east of the Humboldt River. This deer herd faces several challenges, including migration routes that pass through increased mineral extraction activities in the Carlin Mine area, invasion of exotic annual grasses on winter range, increased wildfires on winter range, and deteriorated range conditions on many stopover sites and winter range due to overgrazing by livestock.
These data provide the location of migration stopovers for mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) in the Sheep Creek Range, Nevada. They were developed from Brownian bridge movement models (Sawyer et al. 2009) using 68 migration sequences collected from a sample size of 36 animals comprising GPS locations collected every 1-25 hours.