This Sunday, Nov. 15, tens of thousands of Michigan residents and nonresidents will take to the fields and forests to enjoy deer hunting. The Department of Natural Resources would like to share a few helpful reminders with those who will be heading out to hunt.

• The firearm deer season runs Nov. 15-30.
• Don’t forget to wear hunter orange. See page 18 of the Hunting and Trapping Digest for hunter orange clothing requirements.
• A deer or deer combo license can be purchased at a license agent or online at E-License.
• There are public- and private-land antlerless deer licenses still available.
• Be aware of any antler point restrictions that may be in effect where you are hunting.
• Deer hunting hours are found in the 2015 Hunting and Trapping Digest, which is available at mi.gov/dnrdigests.
• Be aware of the baiting and feeding rules and restrictions for deer in Michigan.
• Don’t forget to bring your deer to a DNR check station and pick up one of the DNR’s deer cooperator patches. Find the check station nearest you on the 2015 Deer Check Station Map.
• Bovine tuberculosis is still a major concern in the northeastern Lower Peninsula deer herd, so please be sure to bring your deer to a check station if you hunt in DMU 487.
• Due to finding chronic wasting disease in free-ranging deer in Ingham County, there is mandatory deer registration for the following townships in Clinton, Ingham and Shiawassee counties: Alaiedon, Bath, Delhi, DeWitt, Lansing, Meridian, Wheatfield, Williamstown and Woodhull.
• Learn more about chronic wasting disease and how you can help by visiting mi.gov/cwd.
• Watch the instructional video on how to quarter a deer. This may be helpful if you wish to store your deer after you have submitted the head to a DNR deer check station in the core CWD area for testing.
• Those still looking for places to hunt on public land can check out Mi-HUNT – a cutting-edge, Web-based, interactive mapping application that can help hunters plan their next trip.
• Hunters who have filled their freezers but want to keep hunting are encouraged to consider donating a deer through Michigan Sportsmen Against Hunger. Find a participating processor at www.sportsmenagainsthunger.org.

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LAWRENCE, Kan. – Game Vector, a unique game tracking system, brings state-of-the-art electronic technology to the Empire State, by greatly improving a bow hunters ability to locate and recover arrowed game—an issue all too common in bow hunting. Dennis Steinman, the products inventor, developed the tracking system when he agonized over a lost trophy whitetail deer. He later recovered the deer, but vowed to use his 30 years in the electronics industry to solve the issue of lost game.

The staff at the New York State Department of Conservation evaluated the various components of the Game Vector system and found the device in accordance with pertinent rules and regulations governing bow hunting in New York State,” stated Douglas Stang Assistant Director, Division of Fish, Wildlife and Marine Resources. “We are committed to assisting hunters with fair chase, ensuring good ethics while afield, and enjoying their outdoor experience. This system provides another tool to help fulfil those goals”

The system uses a transmitter that is fitted onto the shaft of an arrow. Upon impact, the transmitter separates from the arrow’s shaft, attaches to the animals hide and transmits radio frequency signals to a separate handheld receiver, used by the hunter to recover the animal. Read more

This from The Sportsmen’s Alliance…

Florida’s first bear season in decades was slated for the last seven days of October. It lasted only two.

The shortened season wasn’t due to the protests and lawsuits of animal-rights activists, but instead to the sound management of the state’s fish and wildlife department.

Just two days into the season, 295 bears were killed in the four designated units. The quota biologists set for the season was 320. With so many bears taken so quickly, officials exercised a conservative approach to managing the estimated population of 3,200 bears and ended the season.

We applaud the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s decision to not only exercise a conservative approach to the state’s first bear hunt, but to use hunting as means to scientifically manage them – especially in the face of vocal and emotional, yet factually lacking, objection.

The fact that so many bears were taken so quickly only underscores that management through hunting was needed. Population levels have exceeded the carrying capacity of the habitat (and are likely higher than estimates) in Florida, and encounters – sometimes resulting in violent attacks – have risen.

Unlike the dogmatic animal-rights activists who protested and impeded scientific management from the start, we believe in a holistic approach to resolving wildlife conflicts and management – one where hunting, in all its forms, is employed to manage wildlife in accordance with habitat and predator-prey balance. Used in conjunction with commonsense trash management and other practices in areas bordering bear habitat, humans and bears can peacefully coexist.

Without a doubt, Florida’s bear hunt was a success – perhaps most of all for the thousands of bears that remain in the state, for now they have a little more room and more resources to enjoy in the state’s forests and swamps.