HARRISBURG – When the subject turned to elk at the spring meeting of the Pennsylvania Game Commission, it become more evident than ever that the biggest challenge in taking a Pennsylvania elk is being fortunate enough to draw one of the 50 tags – not including the Special Conservation Tag which was auctioned earlier this year at the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation annual banquet.
Pennsylvania is again reaping the rewards of its expanded efforts at recruiting new sportsmen into the fold through the Mentored Youth Hunting Program. According to the Pennsylvania Game Commission, it issued nearly 30,000 mentored youth hunting permits during the 2009-2010 hunting season, bringing the state's total to more than 100,000 since passing a Families Afield measure in 2005.
Representatives of waterfowl organizations, interested hunters and the public are invited to attend a briefing sponsored by the Pennsylvania Game Commission on the status of Atlantic Flyway waterfowl populations and proposed preliminary federal frameworks for the 2010-11 waterfowl hunting seasons. The session will be held Friday, Aug. 6, beginning at 1 p.m., at Haldeman Island State Game Land 290, directly across from the Ranch House Restaurant along Routes 11/15 near Amity Hall.
Although concurrent black bear-deer hunting has been eliminated this year in Pennsylvania, the state's hunters – especially those in the northeast – will be able to extend their bear season in New Jersey.
Yes, after five years of political stonewalling, New Jersey will have a black bear hunting season in December.
KEMPTON – Just the name "flintlock" alone should be enough to emphasize the importance of using a quality flint to assure consistent, dependable ignition when in the deer woods or on the firing line with these unique muzzle loading rifles.
Fortunately, for regional hunters and target shooters who began using flintlock rifles since the resurgence of muzzle loading in the mid 1970s, there were enough specialty shops that made finding true flints easier than finding certain calibers of factory ammunition is today.
Pennsylvania continues to target poachers by increasing penalties and fines with House Bill 1859 sponsored by House Game and Fisheries Committee Chairman Ed Staback (D-Lackawanna) being signed into law last week, which goes into effect within 60 days.
HARRISBURG – As a general rule, hunters want more deer; farmers want fewer deer; and insurance companies want almost no deer.
Added to this equation are differing views within the Pennsylvania Game Commission on how to manage the statewide deer herd. On one side are the PGC biologists conducting the agency's deer-management program; on the other, based upon the voting by the majority of the eight members, is the board of game commissioners.
An Adams County man, Michael Eugene Sponseller Jr., 19, of East Berlin, was found guilty and sentenced to pay $1,100 in fines and $5,000 in replacement costs and faces revocation of hunting privileges for up to six years for the unlawful poaching of a trophy-class whitetail deer in York County, according to Pennsylvania Game Commission officials.
It has been said since some caveman downed the first trophy saber-tooth tiger that records are made to be broken.
Some records, however, achieve almost reverent status and the keepers of the records seemingly refuse to recognize when they are broken. Certainly the family of the late Roger Maris knows all about that.
Nominations are being accepted through Friday, June 18, by the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission for three annual awards. Information and nominating procedure is available on the PFBC Web site at www.fishandboat.com/award.htm for the following awards:
