The Arkansas Game and Fish Commission held a chaotic debate Wednesday over its proposal to allow hunters to use straight-wall cartridges during muzzleloader deer season.
When the commission proposed the regulation, we presumed that it referred single-shot, breechloading rifles of traditional rolling block and falling block designs. We were not corrected when we discussed it in those terms.
Actually, the proposed regulation will allow hunters to use repeating rifles that are chambered for straight-wall cartridges.
A straight-wall cartridge has a case that does not taper. The projectile is the same diameter as the case. This differs from bottleneck cartridges which have a pronounced shoulder. The projectile diameter is smaller than a bottleneck case. Straight-wall rounds produce lower chamber pressures than bottleneck rounds, and they are slower.
On Wednesday, the commission debated extensively about what types of firearms will be allowed during a season that is currently limited to muzzleloading firearms. Brad Young, the commission's chief of enforcement, said that lever-action and bolt-action firearms will be allowed in addition to single shot models. Only semiautomatic firearms will be prohibited.
Curiously, there was disagreement about the definition of "semiautomatic." Young specified AR-15 platforms that are chambered for straight-wall cartridges. Commission Director Austin Booth urged caution because other manufacturers, like Sig Sauer, chamber rifles for straight-walls that are not built or based on the AR-15 design.
"I recommend that you define it by the trigger mechanism and stay away from the AR-15 thing," Booth said.
For clarity, we asked if the commission really intends to allow repeating firearms for muzzleloader season. The answer was negative. Semiautomatics would be prohibited. That suggests that the commission defines only semiautomatic weapons as repeaters, which is false.
By definition, any firearm that has a magazine is a repeating firearm.
Also, the commission's definition will allow pump-action shotguns shooting slugs in muzzleloader season. A shotgun shell loaded with a slug is a straight-wall, single-projectile cartridge. A Browning BPS or a Remington 870 equipped with a rifled barrel is not a shotgun. It is a rifle.
To experience this level of confusion the day before it formally presented the regulation to the public gave an impression of carelessness.
As a hunter and consumer, I would welcome the ability to use my 20-gauge BPS with its scoped, rifled slug barrel before modern gun season opens. I would appreciate the opportunity to use my Henry Repeating Arms lever-action rifle in 41 Remington Magnum. According to Wednesday's discussion, both of those guns will be legal in the 2024 muzzleloading deer season. I don't use them in modern gun season because I prefer bottleneck cartridges like 7mm Magnum and 25-06 Rem.
On the other hand, allowing repeaters during muzzleloader season will effectively end the use of muzzleloaders in Arkansas. Hunters will use the most efficient, most lethal weapons available, and that is not a muzzleloader.
Room for compromise exists if the commission wants to revisit the regulation in the future. The commission could reserve the first weekend of muzzleloader season to muzzleloading firearms only. It could then designate a straight-wall cartridge season that would take up the remaining seven days, which includes a second weekend.
Or, muzzleloader season could run from its usual Saturday opener to Tuesday or Wednesday. The straight-wall season could take up the remainder of the usual muzzleloader days.
At least for the first year, this would probably increase hunter participation. Most muzzleloader hunting occurs the first weekend and tails off sharply. After the novelty wears off, participation will probably revert to normal, mainly because mid-October is not a prime time to kill trophy bucks.
Critics of the straight-wall proposal, including some whose concerns have been published in this newspaper, fear that a regulation that essentially extends modern gun season will result in hunters killing too many deer.
That is unlikely. Hunters are limited to an annual bag limit. Some deer management zones have smaller bag limits than the statewide bag limit. No matter what method you use, you are limited in how many deer you can kill.