Description: GMUs are based on New Mexico Department of Game and Fish Big Game Management Units and Game Management Sub-units as described in Title 19 Chapter 30 Part 4 of The New Mexico Administrative Code.
Description: General and Priority elk, mule deer, black bear, pronghorn, and bighorn sheep habitats developed for incorporation into the Western's Governor's Association (WGA) Wildlife Corridors Initiative - Crucial Habitat Assessment Tool (CHAT) complied in April 2013. General and Priority Catagories were developed following guidance from the WGA CHAT Project: States must prioritize SERI occupied habitat into Priority (e.g. crucial winter range, fawning range, migration corridors, etc.) and/or General habitat (e.g. year-round range, winter range, general distribution, etc.). CHAT Project, Western Governor's Association (2012). Crucial habitat areas for elk, deer, pronghorn and bighorn sheep were digitized (at approximately 1:250,000 scale) under direction of New Mexico Game and Fish Department’s species biologists and Big Game Manager. Crucial habitat areas for black bear are catagory levels 1 and 2 selected from a bear model developed by Costello et al. The bear model in use was developed as a result of the 10 year bear ecology study undertaken in New Mexico and completed in 2001 (Costello et al. 2001). The model relies on occurence of vegetation that bears use as cover and forage in the state and elevation. While bears do occur, and breed, outside of the modeled area it is generally in small habitat patches and their occurance there may be ephemeral in nature. The model describes 3 levels of habitat quality but we only use the best quality habitat to estimate the population as a conservative measure.
Copyright Text: New Mexico Department of Game and Fish.
Costello, C.M., D.E. Jones, K.A. Green Hammond, R.M. Inman, K.H. Inman, B.C. Thompson, R.A. Deitner, H.B. Quigley. 2001. A study of black bear ecology in New Mexico with models for population dynamics and habitat suitability. Final Report, Federal Aid in Wildlife Restoration Project W-131-R, New Mexico Department of Game and Fish, Santa Fe, NM. 218 p.