Kevin Monteith, a UW associate professor and Wyoming Excellence Chair, records information
about two fawn mule deer temporarily captured for a research project in the Wyoming
Range. Monteith received the Pope and Young Club’s Lee Gladfelter Memorial Award for
making a significant contribution to wildlife conservation and bowhunting. (Tayler
LaSharr Photo)
Kevin Monteith, an associate professor and Wyoming Excellence Chair in the University
of Wyoming’s Haub School of Environment and Natural Resources, recently received the
Pope & Young Club’s Lee Gladfelter Memorial Award.
Established in 1961, the Pope & Young Club is one of North America’s leading bowhunting
and conservation organizations. The award is named for Lee Gladfelter, a prominent
wildlife biologist with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources and a dedicated bowhunter.
The award recognizes a wildlife professional who has made a significant contribution
to wildlife conservation and bowhunting.
Monteith leads a team of researchers working to better understand the ecology and
associated conservation implications of most big-game species of North America. Some
of the group’s work has included first-of-its kind analyses of data collected by the
Pope & Young Club Records Program.
The club maintains a universally recognized repository for measurements of big-game
animals harvested in North America with bow and arrow. Those data were used to address
questions associated with the merits of such long-term data collected in a citizen-science
fashion, and whether they can hold insight to measuring the success of conservation
for big-game animals once thought to be headed toward extinction at the turn of the
20th century.
Since 2013, the Wyoming Range Mule Deer Project -- led by Monteith and his team of
researchers -- has worked to answer critical questions regarding mule deer. The team’s
goal is to meet the important research and management needs identified by both citizen
stakeholders and those responsible for managing the deer populations -- the Wyoming
Game and Fish Department. The work primarily has centered on tracking mule deer throughout
their lives, while assessing their nutritional condition, movement, habitat use and
survival of all age classes of mule deer.
“Through these efforts, this research team is uncovering previously unknown aspects
of mule deer behavior, life history and population dynamics that have direct implications
for the conservation of mule deer in the Wyoming Range and beyond,” says Neil Thagard,
Pope & Young’s conservation chair. “Their discoveries are being used to inform real-world
decisions made about on-the-ground management, conservation and policy while providing
solutions for immediate management concerns, as well as answering foundational questions
in wildlife ecology.
“This outstanding research is truly helping to bridge the gap between science and
policy, and is a project that the Pope & Young Club has been a multiyear supporter
of through our annual Grant-in-Aid Program.”
Thagard also notes that Monteith “is not only a great wildlife scientist, but is an
avid bowhunter and talented taxidermist.”
