MISSOURI WILD TURKEY HUNTERS - LET YOUR VOICE BE HEARD COPY AND PASTE or Make your own comments
Send Comments to - Mike Hubbard - Deputy Director for Missouri Deparment of Conservation - Regulation Committee Chairman & Missouri Conservation Commission - Don Bedell, Barry Orscheln, Mark McHenry, Steven Harrison & Reina M. Tyl - Wild Turkey and Ruffed Grouse Biologist - Missouri Department of Conservation
FLOOD THE COMMENTS Commission Meetings
Title - Don C. Bedell, Sikeston, Chair Title - Wm. L. (Barry) Orscheln, Columbia, Vice Chair Title - Mark L. McHenry, Kansas City, Secretary Title - Steven D. Harrison, Rolla, Member
OPTIONS FOR CUT AND PASTE or Make your own comments
2021 Spring Missouri Wild Turkey Season now holds the record of the worse season in 24-year history of a three-week season in Missouri.
2018 thru 2021 Spring Missouri Wild Turkey Season are the four worse seasons in the 24-year history of the three-week season in Missouri.
On Sept. 10, 1935, about 75 Missouri sportsmen met at a hotel in Columbia were disgusted with then the current state of the wildlife regulations controlled by the government and special interest groups.
The Missouri Department of Conservation - No.1 goal for Missouri Wild Turkey is Quality Turkey Hunting. - Lots of adult gobbling birds. – Last four years you have failed at your goal and it’s been a 20-year decline.
May of 2021 - 1000’s of Missouri Sportsmen ARE disgusted with the MISSOURI WILD TURKEY and TRAPPING regulations are controlled by a different branch of government and now different special interest groups. MDC, NWTF and CFM.
Are you concern with money and hunter recruitment over the wild turkey – I say if the wild turkey population and harvest is high you have more money and more hunters.
Why does the Missouri Department of Conservation and Special Interest Groups year after year does not consider any changes to Spring Season, Fall Season, Trapping Season or Non-Native or Invasive Species regulations in Missouri to stop the 20-year decline in Wild Turkey Population and Harvest, but as the wild turkey population grows the season expanded, but as population decline nothing allowed to change! WHY!!!!!
MDC regulations move at a bureaucracy pace and will take over a year or two just to make a simple change.
Regulation Changes that CAN and WILL make a difference.
1. ALL hens are in every Season protected - No Archery, No Fall Hens, No Bearded Hens. WILD TURKEY HENS Breakdown - STOP KILLING HEN IN MISSOURI – They keep saying number of hens killed do not matter to the population, I say – DEAD HENS DON’T LAY EGGS - If they cannot replace themselves in the short term or long term RIGHT NOW per MDC 5-year search - dead hen definably will not.
2. Furbearer Season Extend to February 29 - Stop letting 40 fur buyers, decide the season. PREDATORS Breakdown
1940 – 1941 – 834,935 pelts harvested (most pelts sold) (over 70% were opossum and skunk pelts) most pelts sold 1945 – 1946 – Missouri Fur Dealer Permits 1,192 1979 – 1980 – 634,338 (2nd highest pelts sold - when average raccoon pelt values were estimated at $27.50. 1997 – 1998 – Over 200,000 Raccoons trapped. 1980 – 1981 – 13,248 trapping permits sold in the state of Missouri (Highest Number) 2011/2012 - 158,356 Raccoons sold. 2019 - MDC issued 41 Fur Buyer Permits 2018 - 2019 – 6,956 trapping permits sold in the state of Missouri 2018 - 2019 – Raccoon totaled 22,562 trapped 2018-19 season resulted in the lowest raccoon “22,562” harvest since 1942 and the longest duration of decline in harvest numbers over the last 25 years with seven consecutive years of decline 2018- 2019 – Opossum harvest totaled 593 lowest opossum harvest on record. 2018- 2019 – Skunk also resulted in the lowest Skunk harvest since 2000-01 only 156. 2018 – 2019 - Coyote population appears to be on a slight increase since the 1970s 2018 -2019 Bobcat season was down 28.40% from 2017-18 The decline in harvest and in the number of bobcat pelts purchased by fur dealers also is likely attributed to a poor global fur market.
3. Landowner’s furbearers are open year-round. WE own 93% of the land. Use the Arkansas Regulations A new free Predator-Control Permit also will be available to private landowners, which will let permit holders shoot or trap bobcat, coyote, gray fox, red fox, opossum, raccoon and striped skunk day or night.
This permit will be available by late August to enable more opportunity to control these species on private land.
Commission Chair Ken Reeves of Harrison and Commissioner Stan Jones of Walnut Ridge explained that the goal of the regulations was not to eliminate any of these species on a statewide basis. “I think everyone knows that the reason we’re doing this is we simply don’t have people trapping and hunting raccoons and opossums like we did many years ago because the pelts aren’t worth much,”
Reeves said. “We’re trying to fill that gap by letting private landowners reduce these predators on their property to try to boost their quail and turkey numbers.”
4. Youth Season move to weekend before regular season opens. YOUTH SEASON Breakdown You cannot kill 72,264 Gobblers and call it Biological Sound!! Cannot have it both ways. MISSOURI YOUTH SEASON GOES AGAINST THE VERY BIOLOGICAL REASON FOR THE DAY THE SEASON OPENS - The season opens Monday closest to April 21st. This corresponds to the historical records of the second peak Missouri Ozark Gobbling. This is the biological reason for the opening day. Which may lead to the great successes in turkey population because the hens get to breed with the dominate birds with the first peak gobbling. So Biological Reason no longer exist - Why not open the season the SATURDAY AND SUNDAY before the Monday closets to April 21st for Biological Reason!
5. Move back to a Two-Week Season – 1 Gobbler Limit until goal is reestablished. The Missouri Department of Conservation - No.1 goal for Missouri Wild Turkey is Quality Turkey Hunting. - Lots of adult gobbling birds.
6. Take the Armadillo off the Non-Native List and put them on Invasive Species list they are documented on camera destroying wild turkey nest while looking for bugs under the nest. They bulldoze thru and destroy eggs and lick up the yoke. The Armadillos are a threat to all ground nesting birds in Missouri – Wild Turkey, Quail, and Whip-poor-wills.
Let me be perfectly clear – Lot more could be and should be done – This is the starter list – But NOT One by itself will matter this is going to be a complicated solution for a complicated problem – Doing nothing is not a solution – SEE past 5, 10, 20 years as proof of that!!!
