Hunting and Fishing News & Blog Articles

As I walked into the Holiday Inn in Cody, Wyoming Thursday night of November 30th I could feel a buzz in the air. That buzz was coming from the nervous energy that permeated the building from the lobby to the large conference room that the Wyoming Game and Fish Department had reserved for what it anticipated to be a large crowd.

The crowd was indeed large, 176 souls signed the official register for this public forum regarding the state’s management of the recently delisted grizzly bear. As I looked around the room it became obvious that the majority of those in attendance were hunters; camouflage and boots were prevalent as were cowboy hats and ball caps embroidered with hunting logos. However, it was not just hunters who came to express opinions and concerns, non-hunters also ventured forth to participate in what would prove to be an evening of civil discussion revolving around this hot button topic.

The discussion began with a briefing by the agency’s Dan Thompson who serves as a large carnivore biologist out of the Lander, Wyoming regional office. Mr. Thompson’s briefing was aimed at educating the crowd on the various terms used by the Game and Fish Department to center the discourse about to take place.

Discussion and public input would revolve around five core areas; population monitoring, research opportunities, conflict management, outreach and education, and last but probably of the greatest concern to most in attendance, grizzly bear harvest management, or in a nutshell, hunting.

As one can imagine that nervous energy I noted when I first entered the building was growing as folks anticipated heated conversations. Game and Fish personnel had thought this through however and broke the large crowd into small groups by issuing numbered and color coded sticky notes to everyone who walked in. After the initial briefing it was time to get down to brass tacks and the evening entered its breakout phase where the real discussions began. Each small group was facilitated by two Game and Fish personnel, my group was headed up by Chris Queen the Powell, Wyoming game warden.

It’s kit building season until the snow melts for me and this is how I will evaluate my gear list.

In the not so distant past I was guilty of reading every gear list known to man, promptly comparing them side by side with my current Excel spreadsheet list. Then, depending on the outcome, starting five threads on the Eastmans.com forum asking if certain pieces of gear are worth the money and would salivate over current sales on said items.

Then something happened. I realized that my gear didn’t pull the trigger, nor did it power me up the hill. It didn’t practice at the range for the hard shots and it certainly didn’t have the patience required to grind out a three day scouting trip in Wyoming’s toughest country.

These are all things that are dependent on you the hunter. Glassing, being in decent condition and of course hitting the intended targets are all skills. Skills are something to be tuned and then mastered. Knowing this, I decided that it was time to categorize my gear by the skill sets required to use it and then invest money in pieces that would actually help me hone those skills.

Skill Set One: Shooting Ability

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Montana Fish Wildlife and Parks (MTFWP) advised hunters a deer killed in southeastern Montana is suspected to be positive for Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD). According to the Chronic Wasting Disease Alliance, CWD is “a contagious neurological disease affecting deer, elk and moose” that causes “degeneration of the brains of infected animals resulting in emaciation, abnormal behavior, loss of bodily functions and death.”

The deer in question was killed in hunt district 510 south of Billings. “We’ve suspected it wasn’t a matter of if, but when CWD would show up in Montana,” said Ken McDonald, MTFWP wildlife division administrator. “Fortunately, we’ve done a lot of work to prepare for this.” Previously, the closest confirmed CWD case had occurred in Wyoming, less than 50 miles southeast of the kill site in this case.

Because CWD detection requires brain samples from dead animals, MTFWP plans to hold a special hunt after the close of the general season to collect enough samples to determine disease prevalence and distribution.

MTFWP lead disease technician Zach Mills told NBC Montana how MTFWP is working to create, “A buffer zone around where that disease was or where that infected animal was identified.” He emphasized, “If it’s something we leave unmanaged, it’s possible maybe in my lifetime, or my kid’s lifetime, or my grandchild’s lifetime, that our herds could be really struggling if we don’t get our hands around this disease collectively.”

Though there is no evidence CWD is transmissible to humans, The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends hunters who harvest animals from a known CWD-infected area have it tested before consumption.

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