OUTDOORS : They Ensure That the Deer and Antelope Play : Hunting: Ranchers and the Department of Fish and Game unite to improve wildlife habitat.

Unlike deer, antelope resist jumping fences, even to save their lives, and so these gentle creatures are easy prey when cornered by packs of coyotes in a rancher’s field.

Not to worry. Since two unlikely allies--California ranchers and the Department of Fish and Game--joined hands, problems such as that have been solved and game habitat improved, while also providing additional opportunities for hunters seeking big game, upland game and waterfowl.

The Private Lands Management Program--also known as the 580 Program for the number of the Assembly bill that created it in 1983--includes 51 ranches with 580,740 acres. Most are in Northern California, although the largest--and southernmost--is the Tejon Ranch with 270,000 acres in Los Angeles and Kern Counties.

Under the program, a rancher licensed to sell hunting privileges must perform specified improvements to benefit game. Many have helped the hapless antelope by using barbless wire, with the lowest strand of fencing at least 18 inches above ground so the animals can slither under the fence to safety.

DFG Director Pete Bontadelli said: “The program is 100% self-sustaining. I don’t know of any other program that provides habitat enhancement to the public at no cost to the public and enhances hunting opportunities.”

Habitat improvement can be water pond improvements for big game and upland game, the planting of wildlife food and cover, prescribed burning to regenerate deer browse, timber thinning to increase sunlight through forest canopies and encourage brush growth, predator control and the fencing off of livestock from game areas.

There have been problems, causing the program to be scaled back from a peak of about 700,000 acres in the ‘86-87 hunting year.

“Primarily because we’ve become a little more educated in managing the program,” said Beth Waterbury, coordinator for Region 1 that covers eight northern California counties and 75% of the ranches in the program. “We have not recommended some licensees for renewal because they have not been ideal cooperators.”

A few have been dropped for failing to live up to their ends of the bargain. One ranch in northern California was dropped because the owner posted adjacent public land as his own and hired a security officer to expel people.

Another was put on notice by the Fish and Game Commission and is currently shaping up--especially since Bontadelli was given the power to immediately pull the license of an offender.

Waterbury said: “A couple of people we have denied looked at it as a depradation program--like, ‘I’m feeding these deer; I’m going to shoot a few.’ We don’t encourage that. That’s not in the spirit of the program at all.”

In some cases a ranch is allowed a longer hunting season than those permitted on public lands--sometimes into the rut, or mating season, of deer, when they are distracted and more vulnerable.

“Some people will never accept the philosophy of hunting in the rut,” Bontadelli said. “It’s irrelevant to the deer when he’s taken.”

Some hunters grumble that the program caters to an elite group of sportsmen who are making ranchers rich, but Bontadelli said: “The issue of what a person charges is not something we’re likely to regulate.”

The basic California hunting license was $19.25 this year, plus $11.75 for a deer tag. In addition, PLM licensees may charge whatever hunters will pay.

Some charge as little as $20, but the average is about $800, and a few, such as Bob Roberts of the 60,000-acre Spanish Springs Ranch in northeastern California, get $3,000 for a fully guided and outfitted pronghorn antelope hunt, $1,500 for deer, including meals and lodging for a week. The Tejon Ranch gets $5,000 for a Rocky Mountain bull elk hunt.

Roberts says he isn’t getting rich. He already was. He got that way by building mobile homes and developing 19 recreation-oriented communities in six Western states.

More than 20 years ago he started buying small ranches along U.S. 395 north of Susanville until his spread covered most of the historic Madeline Plain of Lassen County and western Nevada.

Roberts’ parcels became Spanish Springs Ranch--essentially, a year-round dude ranch offering seasonal horse and cattle trail drives, brandings, winter sleigh rides, hunting and fishing--even swimming and tennis on the headquarters premises near Ravendale.

There is no television and only one public telephone. The individual ranches date from early California settlers and have had their identity retained. The place is still a working cattle ranch, with real cowboys.

But an assortment of heavy duty earth-moving equipment parked in various places makes it apparent that Roberts has much larger plans for his land. He seems to offer hunting only as a service, not the main attraction.

“I can show you a quarter-million dollars’ worth of improvements, not for deer (and) not for waterfowl,” Roberts said. “Up here we’ve got a different set of facts (with) vast lands that were settled 150 years ago--land that would produce something. We hear this word multi-use, but you’ve got to show respect for the land, not abuses. You’ve gotta take a little and give a little.”

There is a 350-acre pond with an abundance of ducks and geese.

“And the first guy that shoots a bird on it goes right back to town,” Roberts said. “I enjoy just seeing them there.”

He does allow pheasant hunting in one of his 4,000-acre fields.

“But do you think you can make money selling pheasants?” Roberts asked. “I’ll give you a 1,000-acre easement to do it, and I guarantee you any satisfaction you get is going to be in here (patting his heart) and not in your pocketbook.”

The DFG allots deer tags to ranchers according to their game populations and habitat.

“I’ve got some left in the drawer,” Roberts said. “We shot maybe five deer this year.”

Waterbury said: “Half of the ranches don’t even sell their deer tags. They just issue them to friends or relatives, or they might barter with them, because part of their agreement is that they have to do habitat improvement.”

In other words, a rancher will give a deer tag to a contractor who builds a livestock enclosure to keep cattle out of deer browse. Some, such as Roberts, donate tags to charity raffles.

Tom Swickard, a neighbor who runs the 35,000-acre 5-Dot Land and Cattle Co., also is in the PLM program.

“The program might have saved a lot of ranches for a few years when the cattle business was bad,” Swickard said. “But nobody’s making any money on this.”

Swickard got 27 deer tags this year. Only 13 deer were shot by hunters, but road kills on his land have averaged 25 to 30 per year, he said. “And that doesn’t count the ones that got hit and went off and died.”

Many of the deer were struck while crossing California 139 to get to an alfalfa field on the other side. Solution: plant alfalfa on both sides.

Swickard also has fenced off fawning habitat from cattle, moved his cattle out of deer range in mid-summer to protect their bitterbrush forage, and restored ponds by cutting down groves of junipers that suck up excessive amounts of water.

“Fish and Game monitors this program closely,” Swickard said. “They send people around to make sure the work is getting done.”

But Waterbury thinks some of the ranchers would do it, anyway, given the DFG’s guidance with the agreement.

“It’s very hard to make it cost-effective for the operator,” she said. “Most of the people in the program have a very strong desire just to see that wildlife populations are maintained--more of an altruistic reason for being in the program rather than a money-making venture.

“There’s a resident herd of antelope in Grasshopper Valley. They did some intensive coyote control in there and ended up having the highest kid ratio of any antelope herd in California.”

Control is a DFG euphemism for killing predators. About 70 coyotes were shot from a helicopter.

“Something like that has to cost the operator over $2,000 for a couple hours of helicopter time,” Waterbury said. “But that particular gentleman was issued only one antelope tag, (so) you know he’s definitely got his heart into just improving the habitat. He’s not even breaking even.”

The Tejon Ranch may be doing better.

“We think we are,” said Don Geivit, manager of the ranch’s game management division that offers deer, elk, upland game, tree squirrels, pigeons and some waterfowl. “We’ve had pay-for hunting since the late ‘50s. What it does for us is give us an opportunity to have some later seasons, spread out some hunters over a longer period of time and so provide a safer hunting environment.”

In exchange, Tejon has improved habitat with controlled brush burning and by building brush piles for quail.

Tejon, with a deer population fluctuating from 4,000 to 6,000, got 255 tags this year and had a success rate better than 80%, charging from $850 to $1,150.

The ranch got five bull elk tags this year but issued only three.

“We get a bunch of guys that want Boone and Crockett (trophy) bulls,” Geivit said. “We thought that’s all we had a decent chance of success on.”

The ranch hopes to develop pronghorn antelope hunting from a small transplanted herd, which may mean alterations in fencing.

“Anything you can do to help wildlife,” Geivit said.