Hunting Archery Duck Deer

F&W spreading word about new deer rules MONTPELIER — The Vermont Department of Fish and Wildlife is working to tell hunters about the first significant changes to the state’s deer hunting regulations in decades.

Officials say they’re working hard to explain the new rules before the Oct. 1 opening of archery season. However, they say they could not publicize the directives until Sept. 2, when the regulations took effect.

“We really couldn’t issue much a lot earlier,” said Fish and Wildlife spokesman John Hall. “It becomes a challenge now to bring Vermont hunters up to date.”

The new deer regulations are posted on the department’s Web site in a format that will make it easy for hunters to print them. The same information has been written up on 100,000 single-page handouts that are being distributed throughout the state, Hall said.

The biggest changes to the regulations, which were approved Aug. 11, make it illegal for hunters to take spikehorn deer — male animals with single spikes for antlers — and reduce the number of deer a hunter can take during the state’s different seasons from three to two.

The regulations also change the areas of the state where hunters can take antlerless deer and prohibit hunters from using bait to attract deer.

One change for archery hunters will be the prohibition on taking spikehorn deer. Archers are allowed to take two deer, one buck with at least one antler having two or more points, and one antlerless deer, defined in the regulations as “a deer without antlers or with antlers less than three inches long.”

However, Hall said, a spikehorn deer cannot be counted as an archer’s antlerless deer.

“It leaves those young bucks protected until they are 2-1/2 years of age,” he said.

The only hunters allowed to take spikehorn deer are youth hunters during the state’s youth hunting weekend Nov. 5 and 6.

A hunter who violates the regulations will be subject to a fine under state law, Hall said.

“We are, like always, urging hunters to read their digests,” Hall said.

The Fish and Wildlife Board implemented the new regulations as a way to improve the health of the deer herd. The regulations went through several permutations before the board settled on the rules that will be in effect this fall.

There’s been a lot of confusion among hunters who are still trying to digest the changes.

“They’re figuring it out,” said Chris Sanborn of R&L Archery of Barre. “We’ve got guys who think it’s the first proposal and some think it’s the second one. I’ve heard some whacky things.”

Sanborn said he discussed the changes hunters who visited his store every day.

“A lot of people ask us what (the changes) are. We’ll hand (the flyer) to them and explain it,” Sanborn said.

Sanborn said some hunters put off buying their licenses until the regulations were finalized and some were so unhappy with the changes they threatened to hunt elsewhere.

“There are some guys who say they’re not going to (hunt in Vermont), but when it gets right down to it, they’ll do it anyway,” Sanborn said
By WILSON RING The Associated Press