Board recommends extended gun deer season

If you weren’t happy with Earn-a-Buck, wait until you read some of the questions on this spring’s Wisconsin Conservation Congress and Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources advisory questionnaire.

In fact, one of the 37 advisory questions from the grassroots Conservation Congress suggests returning Earn-a-Buck — a previously tried and rejected system that required hunters to first shoot an antlerless deer before being allowed to shoot a buck — to the DNR as a management tool.

Six questions proposed for the annual public-opinion poll from the state Natural Resources Board may prove even more controversial, depending on your views about gun, bow and crossbow deer seasons. The questionnaire and a matching online survey for those who don’t attend an April meeting in person are used to help the NRB and DNR gauge public opinion on a variety of regulations proposals.

Several Shawano sportsmen have major roles in these suggestions that could ultimately shape the state’s $1 billion deer hunting economy and either bolster the falling numbers of hunters or further anger some factions and drive them away from the sport.

One fact disputed by few is the drastic reduction in the 2019 gun deer harvest, which was at a 39-year low. The DNR blamed an abundance of standing corn in the fields, giving deer a place to hide, and a late season that missed most of the rut, when love-struck bucks are a bit less wary as they search for does.

The other problem is the overabundance of deer in some counties, which is preventing forests from regenerating. Many county Deer Advisory Councils already issue free antlerless permits to those with archery, crossbow or gun buck permits, but this has generally not achieved a significant reduction in the deer herd.

One of the biggest changes in the six NRB suggestions is a 19-day gun deer season, which would add 10 days at the end of the current nine-day season. This plan would retain the current opening date as the Saturday before Thanksgiving, which would not avoid the post-rut season that biologists blamed for last season’s reduced harvest.

“We can’t change the opening date,” said Terry Hilgenberg of Shawano, one of the Natural Resources Board members who helped create the six proposals with the help of DNR staff. “Legislature sets the opener.”

“The idea is to get more serious with the herd,” he said. “We really want to get the hunters’ feedback.”

Two questions placed on the poll by the Conservation Congress’s Deer and Elk Committee — the Earn-a-Buck question and one that would give the county Deer Advisory Councils the power to regulate baiting and feeding rules in their respective counties — both would require legislative action.

Another question to expand the gun deer season to 16 days but move the opener to the Saturday closest to Nov. 15 was created by Shawano sportsmen Kevin Marquette and Warren “Corny” Schmidt. This idea would avoid a late season that misses the rut, Marquette explained.

“This keeps the opener between Nov. 12 and Nov. 18. That’s a compromise to the hard-core bowhunter,” said Marquette, a former Shawano County Conservation Congress member. “This avoids the Nov. 19 to 23 opener.”

“The bowhunters are going to be against anything,” Schmidt said. He noted that many gun hunters are also bow or crossbow hunters. “After gun season, how many still hunt?”

The Marquette-Schmidt plan started at the county level and made it through the process to the NRB. The two weren’t sure how their plan was spun into the NRB’s competing idea.

The NRB plan would eliminate the 10-day muzzleloader-only season, while the Marquette-Schmidt plan would not. Hilgenberg said the NRB plan would allow all weapons to be used during the gun deer season, including bows, crossbows and muzzleloaders, as has been the case for many years. The same holds true with the Marquette-Schmidt plan.

The other five NRB questions on the spring ballot are:

• Invalidate archery and crossbow buck permits during the firearms season. Hunters with bows and crossbows could still use them during the gun season, but would have to use gun licenses to tag bucks.

• Simplify regulations by eliminating deer management zones. Ten counties currently are split between Forest and Farmland zones, which allows differing management tools, Hilgenberg noted as a disadvantage of this change.

• Establish a two-day no-hunting period between the archery and gun seasons to allow the deer to settle down. Hilgenberg suggested a five-day break between seasons, similar to what was done prior to 2002.

• Eliminate the four-day December antlerless season, if the extended gun season is approved.

• Limiting the crossbow deer season to October for those not disabled or over age 60. Those crossbow hunters over 60 and the disabled, as well as all vertical bow hunters, would be allowed to hunt the entire archery season under the NRB plan. Hilgenberg said the other crossbow hunters would have to buy a vertical bow to hunt the rest of the archery season outside October. He said this proposal was a group effort of the NRB, and not the idea of any one member.

FYI

Ross will explore the crossbow season topic next week and is asking for your comments on the topic by email.

Ross Bielema is a freelance writer from New London and owner of Wolf River Concealed Carry LLC. Contact him at Ross@wolfriverccw.com.

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