Outdoor News Daily

Kentucky’s 2011-12 white-tailed deer season ended Jan. 16 with hunters posting the fourth largest overall harvest ever recorded.

“The 119,656 deer taken was the highest total since the 2008-2009 season,” said Tina Brunjes, deer program coordinator for the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources. “Good hunting weather may have been a contributing factor to the excellent harvest during the last two months of the season.”

Hunters bagged a record harvest of 12,989 in December, which surpassed the previous record by 4,261 set in December 2004. “Muzzleloader hunters were responsible for that big jump, checking in 10,536 deer during their nine-day late season that ran Dec. 10-18,” said Brunjes.
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Hunters need to report the results of most big game and turkey hunts by Jan. 31, 2012. Hunters should complete a report for each and every deer, elk, bear, cougar, pronghorn and turkey tag purchased, even if they didn’t fill their tag or go hunting. The participation and harvest rate information is critical for setting tags and seasons.

Report online or by phone at 1-866-947-6339. To complete the report, hunters need the following information:

Hunter/Angler ID# (ODFW ID#), which is printed on all licenses and tags
Number of days hunted
If they mentored a youth during the hunt
Wildlife management unit where hunted
Number of antler points on the side of their animal with the most points

At this time, only about 37% of 2011 tags have been reported.
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West Virginia hunters harvested 2,007 black bears during the combined 2011 archery and firearms seasons, according to Paul Johansen, assistant chief in charge of game management for the West Virginia Division of Natural Resources. The preliminary harvest data for the combined 2011 seasons was 16 percent lower than the record harvest of 2,392 established in 2010. The 2011 black bear harvest is the third highest in West Virginia history.

“As predicted in the 2011 Mast Survey and Hunting Outlook brochure, mast conditions had a tremendous influence on the distribution of this year’s bear harvest,” said Johansen. “Lower mast availability in 2011 allowed archers to pattern bears more effectively and led to an increased archery harvest. However, a shortage of fall foods drives bears to den earlier, which leads to a lower firearms harvest in the traditional December season. The firearm harvest for bears remained steady compared to previous years because of the early firearms seasons. These early seasons are designed to ensure that counties remain at their management goal.”
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Hunters age 6 through 15 checked 2,193 deer during the late youth hunt Jan. 7 and 8, bringing the total harvest for the 2011-2012 firearms deer season to 238,921 compared to last year’s total of 231,513.

The harvest total for last year’s late youth weekend was 1,292. This year’s combined early and late youth season harvests total 18,585 compared to 14,555 last year. Top counties during the late youth hunt were Macon with 52 deer checked, Franklin with 51 and Lincoln with 45.

Of the 238,921 firearms season total, hunters checked 570 deer during the urban portion, 16,392 during the early youth portion, 190,089 during the November portion, 14,439 during the antlerless portion and 15,238 during the muzzleloader portion.
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