NC deer hunters are heard: Gun season will remain during Thanksgiving Week

ASHEVILLE - The hunting public spoke up loud and clear: Don’t take our Thanksgiving Day deer hunting away.

In response to heavy hunter opposition to changing the time-honored mountain tradition of hunting deer with guns during Thanksgiving week, the N.C. Wildlife Resource Commission dropped its proposal to change the season dates.

Earlier this year the commission held public hearings across the state on proposed rule changes, which included moving the opening season of black powder, or muzzle loading, from the beginning of October to the Saturday before Thanksgiving, and shortening the season from two weeks to one.

It also called for establishing the opening of western gun season for deer the Saturday after Thanksgiving and last for six weeks, closing the first Sunday in January.

For as long as many can remember, gun season for deer always started the Monday before Thanksgiving. That chance to bag some venison for the big feasting day will remain.

The Wildlife Commission voted Wednesday to retain the traditional dates.

MORE: 'Dramatic' changes coming to WNC deer, bear hunting rules

There was overwhelming opposition at the hearing in Clyde for District 9, which encompasses much of Western North Carolina. Nearly two-thirds of the comments received were opposed to changing the western deer hunting season, at 183 comments against and 60 in favor of the proposal. Across the state, 855 people opposed the changes, with many citing Thanksgiving Day and week as a traditional time to youth hunting.

“We heard very well-articulated, very passionate folks that talked about the cultural and traditional aspects of deer season and commissioners really took that to heart,” said Kyle Briggs, Wildlife Commission chief deputy director.

“There was a lot of discussion on how to balance that with the biological information our staff had provided and ultimately where they came to was leaving season date and frameworks alone.”

The one exception was moving Polk, Rutherford and Cleveland counties out of the western zone and into the northwestern deer season schedule and retaining the moderate gun either-sex season.

Following are the western deer hunting dates for the 2018-19 season:

Archery: Sept. 8-30, Oct. 14–Nov. 18, and Dec. 9–Jan. 1, 2019 (antlered deer only).

Blackpowder: Oct. 1-13

Gun: Nov. 19–Dec. 8

The original proposals were made to improve the health of the deer herd, said David Cobb, wildlife management division chief.

“What we were and continue to work toward is a herd that’s better balanced in terms of sex ratios, having the timing of the reproductive season better aligned with hunting season, focus in on the peak of the rut, having especially gun season align more closely with the peak of the rut,” Cobb said.

Research found the peak rut season to be Dec. 2. Moving the gun season to later in the fall would have allowed more time for deer to breed and for more mature bucks in the herd.

The commission did pass proposals to shift either-sex days to the beginning of the gun seasons rather than the end, to allow for increased opportunities for hunting does and antlerless deer.

“All those things help improve the biological condition of the herd and help concentrate reproduction into a smaller time frame, which has a lot of benefits over the long term for the population,” Cobb said.

He said that based on data, the deer population has declined in some parts of the state, but it appears to be steadily increasing in Western North Carolina, being boosted by private landowners managing forests to create more early successional habitat through logging or clearing land for agriculture, creating the kind of habitat that deer like.

There were 161,854 deer harvested across the state in the 2017-18 season, including 15,527 in the western region.

The proposals also included lengthening black bear season in the mountains and opening it two weeks earlier, on Oct. 1 rather than mid-October to account for the overlap with deer season. Because the deer season has not changed, the bear season will not change, Briggs said.

Commissioners also voted to implement a statewide bag limit of two antlered and four antlerless deer.

Learn more

For more on upcoming hunting season dates, hunting rules and regulations, visit the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission website at www.ncwildlife.org.