Morrris commission hikes hunting places
July 26th, 2006 by Administrator
Park commission hikes hunting places, hours
The Morris County Park Commission Monday unanimously approved a revised wildlife management plan that will increase hunting places and hours in the continuing effort to reduce the number of deer in county parks.The commission heard sharp criticism of its policy Monday from Barbara Sachau of Florham Park, the only member of the public at the meeting. She said the commission has ignored a petition filed in the past with 1,100 names calling for an end of hunting in the parks.
Sachau questioned the park commission’s reported deer-vehicle accident totals and asked why the commission allowed an employee to promote the killing of deer.
Commission chairman Nicholas Cameron said that 11 Morris County towns have their own deer hunting programs, and, banging his gavel loudly on the table, told Sachau that she was out of line for asking about an employee’s job. He insisted that personnel matters were not a topic for public discussion.
Backing an employee
Park commission executive director David Helmer said that Rob Jennings, the park’s wildlife supervisor, was hired in 1995 to supervise a contraceptive program that was tried and failed at the Frelinghuysen Arboretum. He disputed Sachau’s allegation that Jennings was hired to promote the killing of deer.
The revised regulations call for expanding the hunting times by an hour at the beginning and end of the period, adding some areas of existing parks to those where hunting is allowed, working with municipalities and landowners that neighbor county parks to allow hunting on additional acres, and working to better promote the program.
Last year 97 deer were killed by hunters in Morris County parks.
Jennings, when he introduced the revised plans to the commission last week, said that hunting remains the most effective deer-control method. He pointed out that early results in a 5-year pilot program at Giralda Farms in Madison to test a new type of contraceptive had, in its first year, produced disappointing results.
Car-deer crashes
The number of deer-car accidents in Morris County nearly doubled from 2003 to 2004, Jennings said. In 2003, there were 1,276 reported crashes, and 2,331 in 2004. Statewide statistics showed the same pattern, he said, with 7,689 in 2003 and 13,599 in 2004.
The county proposal includes:
• Start bow hunting after Oct. 2.
• Add one hour for hunters at “morning only” sites, and extend “out of woods time” from 11 a.m. to noon.
• Add a bow hunting program to Jonathan’s Woods.
• Add the Badenhausen Tract to Lewis Morris Park.
• Add the rest of Schooleys Mountain parkland to the already established program.
• Add Mount Hope Historical Park with limited bow and shotgun dates.
• Add the Luce property to the Black River program if the county owns it and it is posted.
• Ask Morris, Harding and Chatham townships for participation and cooperation for the program at Loantaka Brook reservation.
• Ask Morris and Hanover townships for participation and cooperation at Frelinghuysen Arboretum.
• Create and distribute aerial maps with designated hunting and safety zones, check-in areas and parking areas to all participants and municipalities.
• Create a Pathways (county park newsletter) article that connects hunter venison donation programs with general public entities willing to accept the meat.
• Add the hunting schedules to the park commission Web site and Pathways.
• Add wording in letters to adjacent landowners, asking about their interest in including their land in the county management program, or ask whether they would forego the 450-foot safety zone buffer regulations.
• Change registration to have no specific closing date; allow registration to remain open until all hunting slots are filled.
• Increase the registration cost to $15.
Hunterdon County also recently opened more of its park system for deer hunting