Wildlife-Friendly Fencing:
Connecting Habitat, Supporting Landowners

Mule deer are mobile animals and depend on the ability to move between daily or seasonal habitats without major obstacles or barriers. Fences, important for livestock and property boundaries, are abundant throughout mule deer range and create barriers to movement, limit access to seasonal ranges and water, fragment habitats, and cause injury or death through entanglement, especially for fawns and yearlings. MDF works in identified priority habitats to remove unneeded fences and to modify required fences to a wildlife “friendly” design, with smooth bottom wire high enough for animals to go under and a top wire that is low enough for all age classes to jump. MDF is also working with to implement the newest type of fencing, “virtual fencing,” which uses technology to manage livestock and does not require constructed fence of posts and wire. The future of mule deer conservation depends on our ability to connect habitats across increasingly fragmented landscapes and limit injuries and death to animals from fences.