MDWFP Commission Hears Advanced WMA Draw Hunt Rules at Monthly Meeting
Published Tuesday, September 13, 2022 at 3:28 PM
SARDIS — The Mississippi Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks Service Commissioners attended their monthly meeting on Tuesday morning. They approved a proposed rule motion to create a senior WMA hunt, and received reports on license sales, law enforcement citations, and public comments on supplemental feeding during turkey season.
MDWFP Wildlife Director Russ Walsh said proposed rules 1.12 and 1.46 would create a senior WMA draw hunt against the Phil Bryant and Mahannah WMAs. From 19th January 2023 he will be on a two day hunt until 20th January.
The Commission moved to approve the proposed rule. It will enter a 30-day comment period and may be finally voted on at the next committee meeting.
Walsh said he hopes to draw 125 seniors between the two WMAs. He added that hunting is the weapon of choice and that bag limits are $1 legal and one hornless deer. will be open until Lottery applicants can participate with a partner. You can bring a non-hunting partner with you if you apply for it yourself.
Turkey Supplementary Feeding
Christopher Winter stood before the committee and asked for action to be taken on in-season supplemental feeding of turkeys to clarify the rules. It is illegal to hunt turkeys, but supplemental feeding of wildlife year-round is not, except in chronic wasting disease areas.
Commission Chairman Bill Cossar said during the 2021 turkey season, 2022 saw 57 subpoenas issued for 53 feeding violations. He said it’s not a big deal, but he can understand the confusion about what is defined as feeding.
“The problem is people throw corn on the road and take turkeys to themselves or shed them in front of the blinds. It’s the bait,” Cossar said. “Suppose someone has his 500 acres of land and has a feeder. He may not be able to hunt where the feeder is, but the birds may take him to the feeder. No, there was some confusion there.”
District IV Commissioner William Maunger said he would proceed on his advice. Further public comment and rule changes may occur if biologists recommend changes. District II Commissioner Scott Koopwood said he has an elderly friend who hunts turkeys. The man is having trouble attracting birds from land where he has supplemental feeding.
“We need to see it. There are many facets to it,” he said.
license sales
Cossar said it was important to allow monthly license sales that fund 90% of MDWFP. License sales revenues were strong in August, said Jason Thompson, head of the License and Boat Division.
Revenue increased 5%, sales of non-resident licenses increased 7%, and sales of WMA permits for non-residents increased 32%. Thompson said he sold 1,893 licenses during alligator season, up from 1,762 last year.
Velvet Season has sold 2,052 permits as of Sept. 12 for archery equipment, legal spending, and hunting on private property only this weekend. $50 per deer permit yields $29,550 in revenue.
law enforcement statistics
MDWFP law enforcement chief Jerry Carter reported that a total of 533 subpoenas were issued in August. Of those, he said, 200 were unlicensed, 43 were unregistered boats, 27 were personal flotation device violations, 21 were not running his lights, and 16 were trespassing. He added that his cops spent a lot of time on the first weekend of pigeon season.
He did not report the total number of tickets written at the conference or citations of any kind, but did mention a few specific citations. Four of them captured protected birds such as songbirds.
“Our officers did a great job documenting the field, educating them on safety, doing license checks and making sure they wrote citations,” he said. ran the risk of not getting caught without a licence.The majority of these offenses were between the ages of 20 and 50, mainly because they didn’t have time to buy one. Check your license receipt on your phone and the license for the MDWFP app is enough.”
The MDWFP Committee’s next meeting will be held on October 19th at 1:30 pm at the McHenry Shooting Range in Perkinston, Mississippi.
Comments
Post a Comment