Steve Griffin: Here’s what I would change about Lower Peninsula deer regs

In a treestand, free of distractions including deer, I pondered: what would I change about Lower Peninsula deer hunting in Michigan?

I was light with suggestions this year when the Natural Resources Commission and DNR conducted their Deer Hunting Initiative, an evaluation of deer management challenges that drew more attention in its launch than in its rather thin set of changes on NRC-hand-picked subjects.

So I’ve asked myself and buddies, as the current season plays out: If drawing up all-new rules on a blank sheet, what might we include?

Bucks. Fifty years ago the limit was one deer per year, a legal (spike or better) buck with a firearm, antlerless allowed if you drew a “doe permit,” or any deer with a bow.

Shoot a deer, you were done for the year.

Gradually the herd and the harvest all expanded, until a hunter could take four bucks per year, on separate two-deer firearm and archery licenses. Unless you drew that permit, antlerless deer were legal only on archery tags, and bowhunters were relatively few.

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Now, the herd’s huge and top-heavy with does, and deer managers eager to have restored hunter numbers bring them back into balance. Some – not all – hunters want to carry more bucks to advanced ages in which they grow larger bodies and antlers, the way we’ve long kept “score.”

Whether hunting for freezer or wall, nearly everyone I’ve asked has replied: One buck is enough, however you get it.

The hunter out for a trophy could hold out for their one buck, and might take an antlerless deer or two meanwhile or afterwards. (Some say one buck each, archery and firearm.)

Youth hunt? It may give some new hunters unreasonable expectations of big-buck availability, but woods time will tame that. Adults are doing the shooting? Turn ’em in!

But I don’t think it’s a good idea is to take a young hunter, sit him or her in a mid-September deer stand, and tell them they can’t shoot a nice buck that shows up. (By the way, I’m betting that by the time the youth hunt rolls around in September, the NRC’s new antlerless-only provision gets peeled away.)

Calendar. Hunters have long debated whether to open the season on the now-traditional November 15, or a floating date (November’s third Saturday often suggested.)

Both sides have solid arguments. The traditional opener is just that, traditional, easy to remember, and might bring a bit less mayhem than a weekend launch. But a Saturday start would fit into more school and work schedules, especially of those early in careers – the ones we need to recruit to keep this hunting/ conservation thing going. I don’t know of any deer hunters who would stay home because of a Saturday opener.

I’ve hunted under both frameworks, November 15 here and Saturday openers in Nebraska, and don’t have a strong preference. But why not alternate, at least for a test period: November 15 one year, third Saturday in November the next, for a few years, and see how it affects hunter participation, satisfaction and harvest?

Antler points? Some landowning hunters limit buck harvest on their land to mature deer, 2½-year-olds and better, in hopes they aim again at that deer when it’s a big one. Most report it’s working and compliance good – because that’s what you agree to, to hunt on that land. It’s good management, if not actually pure conservation.

On public land? The biggest argument against giving a smaller buck a pass is that the next guy will shoot it – not conservation at all, but jealousy. The next guy might let it go, too – but he or she can’t if you kill it first.

About that tradition of 3-inch spikes making a legal buck? That’s tradition, not biology.

I don’t especially like “antler point restrictions,” a clumsy name for the practice, but it feels like the world is shifting that way, so let’s use it to shift some harvest to does.

Bait? It’s illegal. Hunters still do it.

Piles and bags of beets, carrots and corn at every gas station, mineral blocks at farm and sporting goods stores, legal to sell but unlawful to set out where deer can reach it. Enforcement only when it’s blatant or there’s a complaint.

Put out food, climb in a shack, shoot a deer. That’s the whole process for too many hunters. I’m not surprised that, side-stepping the long and satisfying process of truly learning about deer and intersecting their natural lifeways, we’re not retaining new hunters.

Still, clearly the public wants or accepts baiting, and it may be time to again allow small baits, and let hunters decide if that’s how they want to do it.

So, here’s my pipe-dream, simplified framework for the Lower Peninsula:

• One buck per year, however you get it, minimum three or four points on at least one side.

• Unlimited or virtually antlerless licenses when deer exceed social or biological carrying capacity. But a button buck’s a buck, per the one-buck limit above.

• Third Saturday of November firearm opener, alternating with November 15 opener, for six-year test.

• Any legal deer legal for September youth hunt, but bucks count as the one for the year.

• Bait OK, one gallon limit.

• Any firearm allowed in the Lower Peninsula during the “muzzleloader season,” but c’mon, let’s quit calling it that.

That’s my list, and I might change my mind on some features tomorrow, and your views are just as valid.

Starting from a blank page, how would you draft Lower Peninsula deer hunting rules?

Just don’t be surprised if, like several of the veteran hunters I quizzed, you come down to saying we’re doing pretty well.