Editor:
Minnesota hunters, farmers, and wildlife stakeholders are owed a direct answer to a straightforward question: why has the Minnesota DNR Big Game Program not published a deer survey report since 2019?
That responsibility belongs to Dr. Barb Keller, who has led the Big Game Program since February 2019 — the precise moment the publication record goes dark. The DNR’s own deer surveys webpage (https://www.dnr.state.mn.us/ wildlife/research/surveys/deer/ index.html) tells the story plainly: the most recent deer hunter and landowner survey listed is dated 2019. Nothing since. For decades before Dr. Keller’s tenure, annual deer survey reports were a cornerstone of the DNR’s public accountability — population indices by permit area, harvest data, winter severity impacts, and the modeling assumptions behind permit recommendations. Hunters used them to evaluate whether deer populations warranted the tags they were being sold. Farmers used them to understand pressure on their land. Legislators used them to exercise oversight. That information has now been withheld from the public for nearly seven years.
This is not a paperwork delay. The DNR continues to set permit quotas, issue antler restrictions, and manage seasons — decisions that require internal population estimates. That data exists. It is simply not being shared. When an agency makes consequential management decisions based on internal models it refuses to publish, that is not science-based management. That is administrative assertion dressed as science.
The DNR’s wolf program has faced parallel criticism in recent years: population estimates that conveniently support predetermined management positions, methodology opaque enough to resist independent scrutiny, and public reporting calibrated to deflect rather than inform. Minnesota hunters are now watching the same pattern emerge in deer management under Dr. Keller’s watch. Coincidence is possible. A pattern is harder to dismiss.
Dr. Keller holds a PhD in Wildlife Science. She knows what transparent, reproducible population reporting looks like. The question is not whether she is capable of producing it. The question is why she has chosen not to.
Minnesota deer hunters fund this program through license fees. TheydeservetoknowwhattheDNR actually believes the deer population is, how that estimate was derived, and how current numbers compare to historical baselines. That is not an unreasonable demand. It is the minimum standard of public accountability for a publicly funded wildlife agency. Another good question, why doesnt the Minnesota Deer Hunters Association demand these surveys? The Executive Director serves on the Deer Advisory Committee and is apparently silent on this topic.
I am calling on Dr. Keller to publish a complete deer survey report — with full methodology, permit-area population estimates, and a candid account of why publication lapsed — before the 2026 season opens. If she will not do so voluntarily, the Legislature’s Environment and Natural Resources committees should require it.
Randall Tlachac
Minneapolis, MN
