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THE BOOKCLIFFS, Uintah County — The headless deer carcass on the side of the Kings Well Road is cause for suspicion.
An examination of the pelvis shows that this desiccated tangle of bones and hide was once a healthy buck.
For Clint Sampson, a conservation officer with the state Division of Wildlife Resources, the absence of a head means the deer may have been poached.
"Where these deer hang out in these canyons makes it really easy for them to be seen from the road and shot from the road, too, without many people finding out about it," Sampson said.
He donned black latex gloves and began processing the potential crime scene, taking photos, recording GPS coordinates and collecting DNA samples.
"We've made a lot of cases with DNA," Sampson said, noting that officers can match the genetic material recovered in the field to meat in a poacher's freezer, a deer head mounted on the poacher's wall or even a few tufts of deer hair in a vehicle.
For the past four months, Sampson and other state wildlife officers have been keeping a close eye on the winter range used by Utah's deer herds. The animals are at their most vulnerable from November to March and tend to congregate in areas that make them easier to poach.
- 6,998 hour worked
- 4,300 people contacted
- 63 deer illegally killed
Numbers compiled by the DWR show that officers worked nearly 7,000 extra hours between Nov. 1 and Feb. 1, conducting patrols on the ground and in the air. They made contact with more than 4,300 people and confirmed the illegal killing of 63 deer with an aggregate value of $116,400.
"I have a difficult time putting a finger on the number of 'poachers' that we've caught, but can tell you that we've made some very significant cases involving the illegal killing of deer since the effort began," DWR Capt. Tony Wood said.
"Many of these cases have yet to be filed in the court system and those that have are still being adjudicated," he said.
Still, the saturation patrols on the winter range appear to be having the desired effect. During the winter of 2010-11, DWR officers identified 82 deer that had been illegally killed, Wood said.
"Our intention with this (saturation patrol) effort was to take a proactive stance and deter poachers from taking advantage of the deer herds' inherent vulnerability this time of year," he said.
Reducing the number of deer that are poached in the winter is important, Sampson said, because it means there are more animals for licensed hunters the following fall.
"We are invested in Utah's deer herd. We're concerned about the numbers," he said. "We want people to be satisfied. We want people to be excited about the deer hunt in Utah.
"(Poachers) rob the rest of us of that chance of harvesting a buck legally," Sampson added.
For DWR officers, going on patrol means countless hours of driving through rough country and hiking over uneven terrain, often to root through rotting carcasses in search of the critical piece of evidence that might lead them to a poacher.
(Poachers) rob the rest of us of that chance of harvesting a buck legally.
–- Clint Sampson, DWR
Sampson said his success comes largely from having people tip him off to suspicious activity.
During the patrol Sunday, a trio of woodcutters alerted him to a deer carcass that was impossible to see from the road. They said they'd spotted eagles and crows near the body a few days earlier and had gone to investigate.
Sampson climbed the steep hillside and found another pile of bones and hair — this one with the skull and antlers still attached. He estimated that it had been there about a week.
Again, the camera and the GPS came out. But this time, instead of collecting DNA, Sampson used a hacksaw to recover the skull.
After he made his way back down the hillside over a field loose rocks, Sampson tagged the skull as evidence. Then he photographed a set of tire tracks, left behind by someone who had backed up into the nearby brush several times.
The deer carcass on the hill is one he probably wouldn't have found without the woodcutters' tip, Sampson acknowledged.
"It's a lot of country to cover and the more people we have on our side, I think the better job we're able to do as officers to follow through with poaching calls," he said.
The statewide effort to protect the deer herd on its winter range isn't over yet. Officers throughout Utah will conduct at least one more saturation patrol this month.
Anyone with information about a wildlife violation can call the state's Help Stop Poaching Hotline at 800-662-3337, send an email to turninapoacher@utah.gov or submit a tip through the form on the DWR's website. Individuals providing information can request that their identity be kept confidential.
Email:gliesik@ksl.com
