Might Pennsylvania’s trapping season on fishers expand in the future?
A few odds and ends of Pennsylvania Game Commission wildlife news…
= Pennsylvania’s fisher trapping season has been described by biologists as the most conservative of its kind in North America.
But for who much longer?
This year’s season is set to run from Dec. 17-28 in 13 wildlife management units. That’s a few days longer than it was last year.
Still, only trappers with a permit can participate, and they’re limited to one animal per year.
Changes could be in store for 2017-18, though. Commissioners hinted that – depending on how things go this season – it could be expanded further by next fall.
= The changeover might be complete by spring.
Game Commissioners will give preliminary approval to 2017-18 seasons and bag limits in January; final approval will follow in April.
Along the way, board president Brian Hoover said he plans to recommend that the commission move wildlife management units 5A and 5B into split buck and doe seasons. If the rest of the board goes along, that will leave only the three so-called special regulations units – 2B, which surrounds Pittsburgh, and 5C and 5D, around Philadelphia — with two weeks of concurrent buck and doe hunting.
“I think the rest of the state has adapted to it,” Hoover said.
= Something else commissioners want to discuss: closing fall turkey seasons on Saturdays instead of Fridays.
Commissioner Tim Layton of Windber said the change might be popular with hunters. His only concern, he said, would be if it might impact turkey populations.
The board is to get a recommendation from its turkey biologist, Mary Jo Casalena, in January.
= Pennsylvania’s bear harvest had a chance to be an all-time great. It will have to settle for being good.
Commission bear biologist Mark Ternent said that, as of the first Friday of deer season – when some extended bear seasons are still in – hunters had taken approximately 3,150 bears. There were certain to be additional animals taken on the first Saturday of deer season, though, he added.
Ternent said he expected the harvest to end up around 3,400 to 3,500 bears, which would rank it somewhere around seventh all-time.
= Chronic wasting disease looks as if it’s in Pennsylvania to stay, “at least for the foreseeable future,” said commission assistant counsel Jason Raup.
Game Commission regulations are likely to be changed to reflect that.
Come their next meeting, commissioners will be asked to make permanent heretofore temporary regulations banning the import of high-risk deer parts from states known to have wasting disease. The rules prohibit hunters from bringing back entire carcasses and things like skulls that haven’t been cleaned of brain matter, for example.
That prompted a question.
Commissioner Jim Daley of Cranberry noted that at one time, commission staff was suggesting that the agency just go all in and ban the importation of high-risk deer parts from anywhere in North America, regardless of whether wasting disease had been found there.
“Would this be the time to do it, to just make a nationwide importation ban?” he asked.
There’s no word yet on whether the commission might go that route.
= And lastly, in case you missed them…
The outdoor stories in this past Sunday’s Tribune-Review didn’t make print, which led to questions from some readers.
They are online, however.
You can see a story about commissioners perhaps creating two permits, one of which would be required of hunters chasing stocked pheasants and another of anyone, hunters and trappers included, using state game lands here.
You can also check out a story about other, even bigger, potential changes to seasons and bag limits for 2017-18 here.
It includes details on how and when semiautomatic and air rifles might be incorporated into seasons, the possibility of linking the archery bear season with the last week of the archery deer season – i.e. the rut – eliminating some grouse hunting, adding some bobwhite quail hunting and more.
