Madelia, Minn. - At this rate, deer and pheasants don't have much to worry about. At least as it relates to the weather so far this winter.

Kurt Haroldson, a pheasant researcher for the DNR in Madelia, called it a "welcome change" from last year; "from a pheasant's perspective, it's pretty wonderful," he said.

And as far as deer go, winter so far "is a non-event," said Lou Cornicelli, DNR wildlife research manager.

Indeed, mild temperatures and little snow have marked winter so far. How little snow is there across most of the state? As of earlier this week, there was an inch across portions of the southern part, but the forecast hinted that snow may be gone by the end of the week.

In the northeast, annual aerial moose surveys should be kicking off right about now. But they're on hold because "only half the moose range has eight inches of snow, which is the threshold for doing the survey," Cornicelli said.

For many wildlife species, including deer and pheasants, it's not low temperatures that are especially problematic - it's deep snow, particularly when it's prolonged.

In typical winters, deer consume low-quality foods and depend on their fat reserves to make it through until the spring. But deer in many parts of the state likely still are eating high-quality forage, such as acorns.

"Even adult males - and probably fawns, as well - are likely putting fat reserves on," Cornicelli said. "The fact that they are likely not burning fat reserves - and you can almost argue they are putting them on - bodes really well for them as we get later and later into the winter."

That's quite the departure from last year, when winter began early and stuck around for several months. Officials say deer experienced winter mortality, though they can't say precisely how many perished.

But if the winter remains mild, it should be evident in terms of deer numbers. Consider what happened more than a decade ago, when severe winters killed thousands of deer.

"The best example in Minnesota is the winters of 1995-96 and 1996-97," Cornicelli said. "They were as severe as we've had and deer populations were at modern lows."

Pheasants

Long, snowy winters - like last year - also are tough on pheasants. Roadside counts last August showed the state pheasant population index fell 64 percent between 2010 and 2011, thanks to a tough winter and a cold, wet spring.

"Most of the data on pheasant survival in the winter suggest they don't die directly from the weather - most of them actually die from predation," Haroldson said. "The snow covers up food and cover - especially food - and when they get hungry, they leave cover and get whacked by predators."

That, so far, hasn't been a concern this year.

"We have maybe an inch of snow on the ground right now and within two days, it will be gone," Haroldson said.

While a mild winter will help pheasants, their numbers likely won't fully rebound in a year. In 2001, for example, the winter was similar to last year, as was the spring. The pheasant harvest that fall dipped dramatically.

"Two years later, we had harvests of over 500,000 birds," Haroldson said.

But in addition to good weather in those two years, there was also lots of good habitat across the state's pheasant range. This time around, "so far we have good weather, but we're losing a lot of CRP acres," he said