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Migration Routes of Mule Deer in the Paunsaugunt Plateau Herd in Utah

Metadata Updated: September 15, 2025

The Paunsaugunt Plateau in southern Utah is home to a prolific mule deer herd numbering around 5,200 individuals in 2019. In early October, these mule deer begin their migration from the Plateau traveling south distances up to 78 miles to winter range in the Buckskin Mountains near the Utah-Arizona border. Approximately 20-30% of the Paunsaugunt Plateau herd reside in northern Arizona during the winter, sharing winter range also used by deer from the Kaibab Plateau herd. Beginning in late April, deer reverse their migration to summer range on the Plateau. The most significant challenge for these deer is US Highway 89 which bisects this migration corridor and winter range, where deer-vehicle collisions have historically been a problem. In 2012, the Utah Department of Transportation and partners placed 12.5 miles of wildlife exclusion fence between existing and new crossing structures to reduce deer-vehicle collisions and provide connectivity for deer and other wildlife across the highway. These mitigation measures have been a tremendous success, facilitating over 78,600 successful mule deer crossings and a 77% crossing success rate. These data provide the location of migration routes for Mule Deer (Odocoileus hemionus) in the Paunsaugunt Plateau Herd in Utah. They were developed using 117 migration sequences collected from a sample size of 54 adult mule deer comprising GPS locations collected every 2 hours.

Access & Use Information

Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. License: No license information was provided. If this work was prepared by an officer or employee of the United States government as part of that person's official duties it is considered a U.S. Government Work.

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Dates

Metadata Created Date September 12, 2025
Metadata Updated Date September 15, 2025

Metadata Source

Harvested from DOI USGS DCAT-US

Additional Metadata

Resource Type Dataset
Metadata Created Date September 12, 2025
Metadata Updated Date September 15, 2025
Publisher U.S. Geological Survey
Maintainer
Identifier http://datainventory.doi.gov/id/dataset/usgs-5f8db5d882ce32418791d55a
Data Last Modified 2020-11-09T00:00:00Z
Category geospatial
Public Access Level public
Bureau Code 010:12
Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
Metadata Catalog ID https://ddi.doi.gov/usgs-data.json
Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
Harvest Object Id afb769fb-73bf-440d-81a4-c731b174190f
Harvest Source Id 2b80d118-ab3a-48ba-bd93-996bbacefac2
Harvest Source Title DOI USGS DCAT-US
Metadata Type geospatial
Old Spatial -113.0663, 36.8016, -111.9914, 37.9144
Source Datajson Identifier True
Source Hash e3ab36f3a111dbee471e0754db7d271554429eab399666dfafeefcd12213628c
Source Schema Version 1.1
Spatial {"type": "Polygon", "coordinates": -113.0663, 36.8016, -113.0663, 37.9144, -111.9914, 37.9144, -111.9914, 36.8016, -113.0663, 36.8016}

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