Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, May 13, 1990 TAG: 9007070201
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C-13 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BILL COCHRAN OUTDOOR EDITOR
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
The Department of Game and Inland Fisheries has established a Nov. 12-17 season that will put black-powder hunters afield during the week between the end of the early bow-hunting season and the beginning of the regular firearms deer season.
State game officials estimate that 6,000 sportsmen used a muzzle loader rifle during last year's late December-early January season. With the early season offering am opportunity to get into the woods ahead of the regular dees season, and at a time when the weather is cooperative and the rut is peaking, that number could leap to 50,000 this year, officials said.
"Some people are going to be attracted to the extra challenge it offers," said Bob Duncan, chief of the department's game division. "Others are going to say, `This is my opportunity to be in the woods first.' "
Duncan said the early muzzle-loading season, in a short time, has potential for attracting the kind of crowds that turn out for the first day of the general firearms season, which lures thousands of hunters into the woods and fields.
The early season will be open across the state, with the exception of Lee, Russell, Scott, Tazewell, Washington and Wise counties, in the far southwest, and counties in the east where deer hunting with shotguns only is permitted. The season does not include the Virginia Beach-Chesapeake area, where a special deer season is open Oct. 2 - Nov. 30.
Antlered deer only will be legal targets, and the bag limit will be one per season. Hunters will not be able to use deer tage from their bag game license during the early season, as had earlier been proposed.
The season divided board members of the game and fish department, with Ely Jones Jr., board chairman from Tazewell opposing the early season for counties west of the Blue Ridge Mountains and board member Leon Turner, of the Roanoke Valley, favoring it statewide.
Jones argued that the season would put too much pressure on deer herds located on public lands in the west, and it would disrupt grouse, turkey and squirrel hunters who enjoy the quiet time between the bow and the regular firearms deer season.
"I don't think the modern muzzle loader is that primitive a weapon anymore," he said.
"Muzzle loading is an up and coming sport," said Turner. "It is something I think this agency should support. We should provide all the sport we can out there for our hunters."
The early season came in the wake of a new $12 muzzle-loading license established by the 1990 General Assembly.
No major changes were made in the traditional late muzzle-loading season, which will be open Dec. 17 - Jan. 5 west of the Blue Ridge. Antlerless deer are legal the last six days of that season. Hunters must possess a muzzle-loading license during the late season, but also can use the deer tage off of their big game license.
Last year, during the late season, muzzle loaders reported killing 3,040 deer, which was about two percent of the state's total kill, Duncan said. The early season is expected to boost those figures significantly, he said.
by CNB