The Game Commissioners this week gave final approval to changes in the deer hunting season for several Wildlife Management Units.

The Game Commission Board also directed the Executive Director to use his regulatory authority to remove protection of wild boars, and provide exceptions to allow protection in townships and/or counties where trap-and-removal efforts are underway.

On December 27, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled that wild boars are protected mammals under the Game and Wildlife Code. As a result, the agency must take regulatory action to remove protection from wild boars. By doing so, the Game Commission is seeking to avoid confusion that feral swine, also referred to as wild boars, are a game species, and clearly delivers the message that the agency's goal is the eradication of this invasive species.

The only way to effectively eradicate feral swine is through trap-and-removal efforts, not by hunting them, according to wildlife experts based on experience in other states. (See Audubon PA Urges Eradication of Feral Swine)

Deer Season Changes

The substantial change for the deer hunting seasons is a five-day, antlered deer only season in Wildlife Management Units 2D, 2G, 3C and 4B starting the Monday after Thanksgiving (December 1-5), followed immediately by seven days of concurrent, antlered and antlerless deer hunting (December 6-13). The approved package retains the two-week (Dec. 1-13) concurrent, antlered and antlerless season in the remaining 18 WMUs.

A number of environmental and sportsmens’ groups opposed the change in the deer season. (See Audubon Urges Taking of More Deer, Not Less – Video Blog)

"The goals of the deer management plan have not changed," said Carl G. Roe, Game Commission executive director. "The changes to these four WMUs will allow us to investigate the relationship between antlerless allocations and season length as we move forward with our deer management plan."

Roe noted that the four WMUs were chosen because: WMUs 2G and 4B have ongoing deer research in them; WMU 2D is an area where antler restrictions are set at four points on one side, and is where the agency previously had deer research conducted; and WMU 3C is an area where antler restrictions are set at three points on one side, and is a physiographic area of the state where no extensive deer research has been conducted.

"Antlerless deer harvest versus number of days of opportunity, or the overall season length, will be evaluated over the next four years of five days of antlered deer and seven days of concurrent seasons," Roe said. "Also, we will conduct annual surveys of hunters to address other aspects of the program.

"In the future, stakeholders may be able to provide input by sharing whether they'd like more opportunity via time, such as two weeks or more, or more people involved through perhaps more tags and shorter seasons."

Game Commission staff, per Board direction in January, is preparing a four-year study to determine the impact and effectiveness of the proposed five-day antlered/seven-day concurrent season before additional WMUs may be considered for this season configuration.

The Deer Management Assistance Program that addresses landowner deer management objectives within WMUs remains in place. And, noting that the focus of DMAP is to allow landowners to direct additional hunting pressure on specific areas to meet that landowner's objectives, the Board gave preliminary approval to a measure to allow DMAP antlerless deer permit holders to hunt for antlerless deer in WMUs 2D, 2G, 3C and 4D for the full two-weeks of the firearms deer season, Dec. 1-13, similar to all other 18 WMUs. The Board must approve this measure in June before it takes effect for the upcoming 2008-09 deer hunting seasons.

The Board also gave preliminary approval to a regulatory change to allow hunters in special regulation areas counties (Allegheny, Bucks, Chester, Delaware, Montgomery and Philadelphia) to harvest more than one deer at a time without first lawfully tagging previous harvest, provided all deer harvested are lawfully tagged immediately thereafter.

This change is part of the agency's continuing efforts to find solutions to the high deer-human conflicts in these urban counties. For all other areas, hunters must continue to tag the first deer harvested before attempting to harvest a second.

A complete summary of actions taken on season and bag limits is available online.

NewsClip: Shorter Deer Season Approved

4/25/2008