Secondly, the department needs to implement procedures to help ensure required information is included in all justification forms. This should include dates completed, management objectives addressed, or reasons why objectives are not applicable. The most common response given by biologists to the question of what impacts wildlife populations the most is weather and habitat. While weather data is summarized by some biologists, it is not being analyzed to determine impacts and trends on wildlife populations. The department and the FWP Commission should have relevant data available for use in managing wildlife populations.
Biologists regularly analyze trends in populations.
Weather trends could also be analyzed and compared to population fluctuations to help support conclusions and make management decisions. Compiling and analyzing weather data should help improve wildlife management by providing decision-makers with more information to help identify population changes and predict future impacts. Another important element of wildlife management is harvest data. The department collects harvest statistics through an annual survey and annual check station operations. Harvest statistics provide information on hunters and animals harvested.