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WHAT IF BUCKS WERE OFF LIMITS?
Have you ever wondered what deer hunting would be like if no hunters in your area were allowed to shoot ANY antlered buck for an entire year? Hunters in Waupaca county Wisconsin might give us the answer after their County Deer Advisory Council (CDAC) voted for an antlerless-only permit for the entire 2016 season. The vote was made in order to increase antlerless harvest in a county that happens to be one of the best counties in the state of Wisconsin for trophy bucks.
The change is not finalized, but the outcry following the vote will help hunters in the area realize that if they don’t harvest enough does, drastic measures might have to be used. The basic problem is that Gov. Scott Walker took away the “Earn-a-buck” rule which forced hunters to shoot a doe before they could legally harvest a buck. That regulation was unpopular, but it did the job in terms of harvesting enough does to keep the population down. Now that Earn-a-buck isn’t an option, the council decided to implement antlerless-only tags because hunters killed fewer than half of last year’s goal of 12,300 antlerless deer needed to “maintain” the population.
This is one of those deer topics that pulls at the thread of why we hunt in the first place. It used to be that we did it for the meat and if we shot a good buck in the process it was just a bonus. Now it seems more people are holding out for a mature buck and in the meantime they are left with too many deer on the landscape. If bucks are no longer an option, the hope is that the same amount of hunters will go out and harvest a doe instead.
What will actually happen remains to be seen, but I applaud the efforts of the Waupaca CDAC to expose the topic to more people. At the first meeting where this vote occurred, only 14 members of the public attended. My guess is that at least a couple hundred to several thousand will attend the next meeting scheduled for April 19th at the Waupaca High School at 7 PM. There will no doubt be some angry hunters in attendance, but I bet there are more than a few people that are glad they don’t have to worry about the neighbor shooting a small buck this year in Waupaca county.
Another factor that I think most decision makers overlook is that some parts of the county are not accessible by average hunters. Waupaca county is 97% private land and there are many properties that only have a couple people that are allowed to hunt and some that are off limits to hunting entirely. If progress is going to be made on reducing the populations, landowners will need to increase accessibility to more hunters. I will admit if the rule goes into effect, I would sure love to hunt Waupaca county in 2017!
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