President's Message

 

I extend my thanks to those officers, directors and members who were able to attend the Natural Resources meeting at Lewisburg on April 29, 2012.  There was a strong showing of bow hunters there and I believe that those who spoke, and those who, just by their presence, showed their support for the WVBA’s positions, had a big part in getting the attention of our Natural Resources Commissioners.  We were successful in getting some of the most onerous proposals modified, but were not able to prevent the establishment of a late October doe season.  As always, it is your responsibility to get a copy of the new regulations and read them thoroughly so that you understand what is legal and what is not.  Briefly, the changes made are:

Both the early September archery and fire arm seasons were eliminated.  The reason given was the lack of participation and a prudence to prevent an over harvest due to other season changes.

In counties with very high deer populations, a hunter with an additional antlered deer tag must take a doe before they can use the second buck tag.  This applies to both fire arm and archery hunters.

Some counties had a two deer limit for does and some counties had a four deer limit.  In order to standardize the regulations, those counties will all have a three doe limit.

Several cities hold urban hunts.  The regulations were also simplified so that all the urban hunts will have the same bag limit of seven with no more than two of those being antlered deer.

Unfortunately, from our perspective, three days of doe fire arm season will be held from October 25-27.  Your Association opposed this change, but was unsuccessful in preventing its approval.  However, as in any gun season, you may substitute your bow for a gun and take an additional doe(s) on a class N stamp(s), but you have to wear orange.  Also, you can take a buck on your regular license or RB tag during this season, so it is not a complete loss for us.

Bow season will begin on the Saturday closest to October 1^st.  This year that date is September 29^th.  Bear archery season will also open on that date.

The muzzleloader season was moved up a week in December.

This is not intended to be a full disclosure of the regulations, but a brief overview.  It is your responsibility to obtain, read, understand and obey the regulations once they are published.

While we did not get everything we wanted, which is what usually happens in most things involving different groups with differing agendas, I must thank the game commissioners for being willing to listen to the comments from the public in both written and verbal form and for making changes where public sentiment was strongly in favor of those changes.

The WVBA donated 6 game cameras and security boxes to the Division of Natural Resources for use in its elk study project at the meeting.  It is hoped that this project results in eventually establishing a viable population of elk in West Virginia and therefore provide additional hunting opportunities for our members, which is always going to be an objective of our organization.

And that’s the bottom line.

Bryan Elkins,
President