GREEN BAY, Wis. (WBAY) – If you’re a hunter in Wisconsin, now is the time to start sharing your input on the framework for next fall’s deer hunting seasons.
Starting Monday, March 22, deer advisory councils in counties around the state will hold planning meetings.
Each county can customize how many deer hunters harvest and when.
“This is deer season for DNR staff and the advisory councils as it relates to setting things up for next fall,” says DNR Deer Ecologist Jeff Pritzl.
County Deer Advisory Council members have spent the past several weeks reviewing harvest data and deer metrics from last year’s hunt. “To use it to paint the picture of what we can expect this fall and then setting season frameworks accordingly,” explains Pritzl.
Over the next two months, CDAC’s will make a number of deer-related recommendations for their respective counties, including deer population objectives, antlerless harvest quotas, along with various season framework options like a holiday hunt or an extended archery season.
That will begins next week with virtual CDAC planning meetings.
“This is mostly for the public to listen to the discussion,” says Pritzl, “and the primary opportunity for the public to weigh in will then be the online public input tool that we’ll have on our website running for a couple of weeks in the middle of April.”
Pritzl says CDAC members have already been doing legwork.
“The CDAC members are charged with reaching out to the stakeholder group they represent, so it’s a voluntary process but one represents forestry, one agriculture, one recreation, and all the different aspects where deer impact our lives and so they’re charged with coming to that meeting having interacted with people that represent their stakeholder group,” says Pritzl.
It’s a process, Pritzl says, that gives each county its own identity when it comes to customizing deer hunting decisions that can change year to year.
“And that’s where I think the people that have embraced the CDAC process, and I have appreciated the ability to have that engagement,” says Pritzl.
Copyright 2021 WBAY. All rights reserved.
