Sports

By the time many are reading this, we should have a better idea of what to expect for the fall 2008 and spring 2009 hunting seasons.

The Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency was scheduled to deliver recommendations for the 2008-09 seasons when the Wildlife Resources Commission met in regular session yesterday (Wednesday) at the Ray Bell Building in Nashville.

Chief of Wildlife Greg Wathen, Assistant Chief of Wildlife Ed Warr, Big Game Coordinator Daryl Ratajczak and agency biologists Tim White and Gray Anderson were to have delivered the agency’s recommendations to the governing board yesterday afternoon.

The commission will now have a month to ponder the recommendations and hear from the public before setting the fall and spring hunting seasons at its May meeting in four weeks.

TWRA accepted public recommendations for the season-setting process earlier this year. While those changes that would be recommended to the commission were finalized by the time of this writing, the agency does not make those recommendations public until the commission meeting. And while some years see some recommendations ooze into the database of public knowledge before the commission meeting arrives, mum has been largely the word this year.

One thing some hunters thought might emerge as a hot-button topic this year is the Telecheck system — similar to systems used in Alabama and Kentucky — for checking in big game animals. The system allows hunters to telephone their harvested deer or turkey rather than making a physical appearance at a checking station.

However, hunters shouldn’t expect that change this spring, according to Ratajczak.

“We have considered [the telephone system] in-depth,” Ratajczak said. “For the time being, our current system outperforms all other methods in financial costs, administrative costs, data collection and law enforcement capabilities.”

Another issue that has received much discussion among hunters involves potential changes to the muzzleloader season. Currently, the season opens on the first Saturday of November and closes the following Friday. The season is either sex for the most part, but is buck-only in East Tennessee (Unit B) the final two days of the season.

This spring marks the 10-year anniversary of one of the most explosive series of season-setting meetings ever by TWRC. It began in April 1998 when TWRA biologists recommended Tennessee’s almost unmanaged buck limits — which allowed many hunters to kill a dozen or more antlered deer each year — be reduced to six per year. Commissioners took it a step further and reduced the buck limit to two per year. The following spring, the commission increased the limit to three. However, it was later lowered to two once more in Unit B.

TURKEY SEASON STILL SLOW FOR SOME

If you’re feeling frustrated by a slow spring turkey hunting season, you aren’t alone.

Turkey hunting pro Richard Burchett says that gobbling activity is “way off” from years past in Tennessee.

“Several factors come into play: First and foremost in most people’s mind is that it’s the weather and that thought holds some merit,” Burchett said. “We’ve really not had many decent gobbling days so far this year.”

Burchett, a member of the Turpin Custom Game Calls Pro Staff, said that personal research has shown that a rising barometer is the single most deciding factor to gobbling activity and “We simply haven’t had that many good days this year.

“Due to the weather staying cold for so long earlier this spring, we are at least two weeks behind where we normally are at this time of year,” he said last week. “What we are seeing now is typically over before the season ever begins. What I’m seeing happen right now is that they aren’t gobbling much at all except on the limb and as soon as they pitch out, they are doing a lot of strutting and drumming.”

While the turkey harvest remains down from years past across Tennessee, it continues to be higher than a year ago in Scott County.

The spring hunting season continues through May 11.