Nancy Williams: Hunting season is way more complicated than you think
Heard someone say hunting season is around the corner. Curious, I looked up when it starts. Man, it’s complicated and fascinating. My dad used to hunt about once a year. Without ado. So I thought if a fella had a mind to, he just picked up his gun and went out in the woods to kill a squirrel.
Turns out I couldn’t be more wrong. To start with, the state wildlife management literature doesn’t use the word “kill” — it’s “taking” and “harvesting.” And there’s a mind-numbing amount of information about many varieties of wildlife. There are strict dates for when you can “take” and limits on how many you can “harvest.” Every critter has a season. And for some animals, when the prospective hunter number exceeds the ration of animals determined to be taken that year, only a limited number of “tags” are issued to hunters, chosen by lottery.
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I first read up on big game, as opposed to small game like waterfowl and webless migratory game birds. In big game, you've got your bears, deer and turkeys. Bear seasons are divided into mountain bear, piedmont bear and coastal bear. Within those divisions, there are zones and counties, each with rules for hunting.
“Small game and other” includes raccoon, opossum, squirrel, rabbit, quail, grouse, bobcat, armadillo, skunk and so forth. Noteworthy is that there is no closed season for armadillo. I didn’t even know we had armadillos here. Maybe we don’t. It’s listed to make hunters feel good about not being over-regulated. There’s no closed season in North Carolina for kangaroos, tigers or toucans either. You can take them any time you see them.
Days to crow about
During the season for crows, they can be hunted on Wednesday, Friday and Saturday of each week. Go figure. If you’re about to kill a crow at 11:40 p.m. on Thursday, you need to wait 20 minutes to be legal. The literature lists skunks as “skunks (striped)” which made me think there are other skunks (unstriped) out there. Researched it and found skunks (striped) are the only kind that exist. Maybe the rules include the stripe so the hunters will be reminded not to confuse a skunk with an otter (unstriped), beaver (unstriped) or coyote (unstriped). Since we’re using the skunk stripe to identify it, I’m a little worried about chipmunks and badgers being accidentally harvested.
Or a cow. I read about a study where scientists are trying to determine the purpose of zebra stripes, so they painted white stripes on black cows. In the photos, the paint job was quite well done. Seemed to be a better funded study than the one in another country where poorly-fitted zebra-print dresses were put on black horses. Surely, convincingly painting livestock has to be more expensive than slinging muumuu costumes on them. In either event, I’d be a little wary of the hunter who is looking for skunks (striped).
The wildlife webpage didn’t have pictures, but it might not be a bad idea. In the past, when I heard feral hogs mentioned, I figured they were same as pink farm pigs on television, only wild and homeless. Looked up information about them. Holy hog, was I wrong. They are monsters of the woods. Big, cow-sized, mean chargers. Imagine part Minotaur with quill-like hair. Why is there even a season? Remove them whenever you can. Ditto with coyotes. Because coyotes are nasty, sneaky and extremely aggressive and agile. Plus, pretty sure they’re feeding on our household cats.
What is a nutria?
More news to me is that “Nutria” has a hunting season listed. Nutria. Never heard of it. Would have thought it was a protein drink or breakfast bar. Turns out it’s a large aquatic rodent, looks a lot like a muskrat with strangely bright orange teeth. I smiled recalling the soft rock song, Muskrat Love (Captain and Tennille in the 1970s) could have been Nutria Love instead. I then discovered nutrias don’t make the sweet little squeaks and chitters of a muskrat. Nutria make moos. Small moos, but still moos. Not as cute for a love song.
The few hunters I know, hunt merely deer. Or say they do. Stories from deer camp cause me to think there may not be any hunting going on at all. Deer camp is a big ole’ man cave in the woods where men can be men and get away from the women to be messy and mischievous.
On deer hunting
For those actually hunting, the state deer harvest limit this year is two bucks and eight doe per licensed hunter. Hunters are supposed to report what they kill. Honor system. So the deer population can be monitored and managed. My little math mind doesn’t compute that. Is someone reporting deer births too? To have an accurate count, we need to both add and subtract as events occur. You can report the taking of a big game animal online or you can call 1-800-I-GOT-ONE. (I’m not making this up.) I’m pondering if drivers who hit big game should report those as well.
I’ve known four people to hit deer with their cars recently. Including Young Williams who hit a deer last week driving back roads near his college. He sent photos of the deep dent in the hood, broken headlight, and such right after it happened. When he came home, the hair I’d seen in the pictures was gone.
I asked, “Did you pluck the deer fur out of the crack in the car or did it blow out when you were driving home?” He said he took it out, but wondered why I asked. I don’t know. Just been thinking a lot lately about big game, I guess. Told him hunting season isn’t what you think and shared some of what I’ve learned.
Saw him after that texting his brother. Probably something like, Mom’s weirdly obsessed with hunting rules and the fact that nutrias have orange teeth. Should we be worried?
This is the opinion of Nancy Williams, the coordinator of professional education at UNC Asheville. Contact her at nwilliam@unca.edu.