BOARD APPROVES USE OF BAIT FOR DEER HUNTERS IN SOUTHEAST

HARRISBURG - As recommended in the Urban/Suburban Deer Management Plan, the Pennsylvania Board of Game Commissioners today gave final approval to a simplified regulatory change to permit the use of bait in Bucks, Chester, Delaware, Montgomery and Philadelphia counties, to increase hunter harvest in these large-developed, high-conflict areas.

To reduce confusion, the Board inserted an effective date of Dec. 26, which means that the newly-approved regulation will not be available until the late deer seasons during the current license year. 

"While hunting is the most economical way to manage deer populations, suburban hunters can face many challenges finding access to huntable lands," said Carl G. Roe, Game Commission executive director.  "By allowing the use of bait, there is the potential to increase harvest, hunter success and hunter opportunity in developed areas, and thereby provide additional relief to residents in the highly-developed areas of southeastern Pennsylvania."

Under the amended measure given final approval, hunters are permitted to use bait on only private lands.  Bait may be placed or distributed two weeks prior to the opening of the first deer season and continue until the deer seasons conclude.  Bait accumulation in any one location will not be permitted to exceed five gallons at any given time.

To ensure a thorough review of this new tool, the Board included a sunset provision, which would require the Board to reconsider the matter before March 31, 2010.

While illegal in other parts of the state, the General Assembly and Governor Rendell, in 2004, approved a change to state law to authorize the Game Commission to permit the use of bait for deer hunters specifically in special regulations areas counties, except for Allegheny County.  The law specifically prohibits the use of bait for deer hunters in any other counties.

After examining other states' methods of permitting baiting and development of an Urban/Suburban Deer Management Plan, the agency first took action to permit baiting within the parameters of the law at the Board's June meeting.

Created in 1895 as an independent state agency, the Game Commission is responsible for conserving and managing all wild birds and mammals in the Commonwealth, establishing hunting seasons and bag limits, enforcing hunting and trapping laws, and managing habitat on the 1.4 million acres of State Game Lands it has purchased over the years with hunting and furtaking license dollars to safeguard wildlife habitat.  The agency also conducts numerous wildlife conservation programs for schools, civic organizations and sportsmen's clubs. 

The Game Commission does not receive any general state taxpayer dollars for its annual operating budget.  The agency is funded by license sales revenues; the state's share of the federal Pittman-Robertson program, which is an excise tax collected through the sale of sporting arms and ammunition; and monies from the sale of oil, gas, coal, timber and minerals derived from State Game Lands.

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