Natural Resources Commission to vote Thursday on changes to Michigan deer hunting | WKZO | Everything Kalamazoo

LANSING, MI (WKZO AM/FM) – In an effort to control the state’s growing deer population, the Michigan Department of the State’s Natural Resources Commission will vote Thursday on a series of recommendations that include expanded “antler tip restrictions” aimed at protecting younger bucks and encouraging hunters to harvest does instead.

Most of the proposed changes came from two citizen advisory groups, one for each peninsula, that the Michigan DNR set up earlier this year, in addition to consultations with tribal groups. The agency says the deer management initiative’s teams included a range of hunters, farmers, conservationists and others.

In the Lower Peninsula, the Deer Management Initiative recommends ways to increase deer harvest rates, including efforts to recruit new hunters and educate them about the importance of hunting antlerless deer for population control.

Other, more controversial proposals that could bring significant changes to this year’s hunting season are currently before the Natural Resources Commission. They include expanding the urban archery season, which currently operates in three metro Detroit counties, to seven more, and expanding the early and late hunting seasons for antlerless firearms, which currently only operates on private property, to public lands.

Another proposal would amend the state’s combination deer license in the Lower Peninsula to limit the harvest of two deer to one antlered and one antlerless, essentially turning Lower Michigan into a “one-buck management area.”

Another proposal up for vote Thursday would impose antler tip restrictions across the Lower Peninsula, limiting buck kills based on the number of tips on one side of their antlers.

The proposals before the Natural Resources Commission also include abolishing permits for hunting antlerless animals in a central stretch of Uttar Pradesh where the deer may be moving south. In addition, hunting antlerless animals with bow equipment should be allowed only in the early season.

According to the state of Michigan, there were 58,000 car accidents involving deer last year, resulting in 19 deaths.