NORTHWEST ARKANSAS — A welcome trend in our hunting structure is an eff ort to get more young people involved in hunting.
The general idea is that hunting and outdoor recreation in general is healthy. Some proponents say hunting takes kids away from video games and other indoor fads while providing exercise.
Youth-only hunts are growing, where only people 17 and younger can hunt, although adults can go along with them.
We’ve got youth deer hunts, youth duck hunts, youth turkey hunts. Some of these have been expanded to include hunters over 65.
All this is good, with the understanding that somewhere along the line there will be attempts at cheating. It involves humans, after all.
A few years back when theyouth deer hunts started, a deer was checked in with the name of a 3-year-old child.
We mentioned video games. This has become a broad and busy scene these days.
During the October muzzleloading season, 13-year-old Nick Starr of Conway was high up in a stand with his iPhone. He was playing games.
Nick said he heard a scuffling under the stand and though an armadillo had arrived. But when he looked over the side, down below were white horns. He got his rifle into shooting position and fired nearly straightdown. A nice 10-point buck was his reward.
Arkansas deer hunting season now is a month or so for modern gun. It’s five months for archery and crossbow. Decades back, deer hunting was 12 days - six days in November, six days in December and no Sunday hunting. Separate and longer archery seasons started in 1971.
Deer numbers increased across the state and more hunting was justified, the Arkansas Game & Fish Commission said. Also justified, said Game & Fish, was some taking of female deer. Sotwo additional days of hunting were created, the Friday and Saturday following Thanksgiving.
More Hunting
Arkansas deer kept increasing, and Sundays were added to the regular hunts without undue objections. Another addition was the holiday hunt just after Christmas. This one started with two days and now is three days.
A companion development to youth hunting has been mandatory hunter education. It is required for anyoneborn after Dec. 31, 1968, so that covers people reaching middle age now.
This year we have two youth deer hunts in Arkansas, one Nov. 6-7 and the other Jan. 1-2. The rule for both is that a youth who has a hunter education certificate must be accompanied by a person 18 or older. Accompanied means in the area. A youth who has not completed hunter education must be under the direct supervision of a person 21 or older. Direct supervision means within arm’s length or sitting in the same stand or blind.
Outdoor, Pages 9 on 10/28/2010