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Minnesota Reassess Deer Pop.

blake

Life Member
Minn. DNR to Reassess Deer Population Goals


(AP) — Amid complaints by hunters, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources says it will begin reassessing its deer population goals this spring.

Steve Merchant, the DNR's wildlife programs manager, says those goals have been reached across most of the state. But as deer numbers have been brought down to goal levels in many areas, and even raised in some, hunters have been saying they're not seeing as many deer as they did before.

So Merchant says the agency wants to revisit population goals in southwestern and north-central Minnesota to strike the right balance between hunters, landowners and other interests.

There will be a public input process similar to what the DNR has used before. The agency plans to listen to stakeholders prior to setting bag limits for the 2012 deer season.
 
Where I live in MN I would be in favor of the DNR closing deer season for a couple seasons and letting the population recover....it's bad.
 
How about reassessing having a rifle season in early Nov?!?! How bout moving it to late Nov?!?!
 
Sligh,the hunters with an brains have been harping that for years. They will not budge on the season dates. They think moving the seasons will make it to easy to shoot big bucks. For now at least I will settle for apr's.
 
MN

Sligh,the hunters with an brains have been harping that for years. They will not budge on the season dates. They think moving the seasons will make it to easy to shoot big bucks. For now at least I will settle for apr's.


Statewide APR would help, a combination of a late November gun season and antler point restrictions would put Minnesota back in the top 3-4 states for mature bucks! It would also increase the buck population and get our buck to doe ratio back in line.
 
I have talked about gun season during the rut until I'm blue in the face. The early November deer season is 'tradition' in MN and thats that. Blah blah blah. A very large percentage of MN deer hunters have never seen a mature buck on the hoof and truly have no idea what they are missing out on. I hate the MN deer seasons, period.

The DNR can figure out how to manage a state full of trophy fisheries but IMO have little idea what the heck to do with the deer population.
 
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