Louisiana’s first black bear-hunting season is rounding into shape after the Wildlife and Fisheries Commission passed an amendment to the season structure during Thursday’s meeting in Baton Rouge.
The commission approved the amended notice of intent to open the season Dec. 7 in the state’s Bear Management Unit 4, which takes in all of Tensas, Madison, East Carroll and West Carroll parishes and portions of Richland, Franklin and Catahoula parishes. The season is scheduled to end Dec. 22.
This first bear season in decades will be handled by a lottery drawing for Louisiana-resident hunters. Anyone applying for the lottery must be properly licensed, and hunters selected will be required to attend a Wildlife and Fisheries’ bear hunter training course.
Lottery regulations will be posted after the notice is published in the State Register and becomes part of the 2024-2025 hunting seasons and regulations.
More shrimp
Come Monday morning all state outside waters will be opened to shrimpers.
That’s after Wildlife and Fisheries biologists determined the white shrimp in waters between Marsh Island and Freshwater Bayou Canal had grown to marketable size. That area had been closed for several weeks because of a predominance of small white shrimp.
Snapper season
There will be a bonus to Monday’s early opening of the recreational red snapper season.
That’s because federal fisheries managers announced last week a May 1 opening of the Gulf of Mexico greater amberjack season.
In past years, the red snapper and amberjack seasons overlapped for only a handful of days in late May, but when the Wildlife and Fisheries Commission voted to move the red snapper season up five weeks from the usual Memorial Day weekend, it gave offshore reef fishermen that chance to catch these two species along with gray triggerfish on the same trip.
The amberjack season will close May 31.
On the bass
The Live Oak High School team of Jaden Lawdermilt and Rowdie Thacker brought in a five-bass limit weighing an even 15 pounds to place sixth among the 50 high school teams invited to compete in the MLF Abu Garcia High School tournament on Table Rock Lake in Missouri.
An Osage, Missouri, team won with a 20-pound, 2-ounce total.
And, last weekend Jeremy Norris of Ama finished third (15 bass; 46 pounds, 15 ounces) on the Arkansas River near Muskogee, Oklahoma, in a B.A.S.S. Nation qualifier. Norris earned a spot in the Nation’s national tournament set for November.
High honor
Wildlife and Fisheries’ senior agent Heather Fitzgerald was honored for her enforcement activities Thursday when the Louisiana Charter Boat Association awarded her the annual Theophile Bourgeois Memorial Award.
The LCBA honor offered the honor “for the law enforcement agent that best exemplifies the LDWF mission, specifically pertaining to promoting professionalism within the Louisiana charter for hire industry.”
A major step
Both the American Sportfishing Association and the National Shooting Sports Foundation heaped praise on the U.S. House of Representatives for a unanimous vote passing the Expanding Public Lands Outdoor Recreation Experiences — EXPLORE Act (HR 6492) — last week.
The long-debated move improving public fishing and hunting access along with planned upgrades in facilities and infrastructure on public lands and waters. The act includes national parks, wildlife refuges and forests.
“By making outdoor recreation a priority, Congress has shown its support for America’s 54.5 million anglers and the $148 billion sportfishing economy they support,” ASA spokesman Mike Leonard said.
The NSSF got behind a Range Access Act (included in the bill). This requires the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management “to have at least one qualifying recreational shooting range in each national forest and BLM district which is crucial to ensuring safe public recreational shooting.”
The EXPLORE Act also contains provisions to improve hunting and recreational shooting access.
The U.S. Senate must pass EXPLORE, then it needs the president’s signature.
Bad and ugly
Hunting birds over bait carries severe penalties, and state Enforcement Division agents were extra busy during last weekend’s turkey-season opener.
Agent cited 10 for allegedly hunting turkeys over baited areas.
Cited were Jacob Gauthier, from Addis; Tristin Landry, Clinton; a juvenile in East Feliciana Parish; Paul Farnham Jr., Lafayette; Russell Sullivan, Bossier City; Lloyd Dunn, Epps; Raymond Laborde II, Many; Aaron Latiolais, Lafayette; Randal Stewart, Albany; and, Darron McCann, Marksville.
Agents got John Hubbard, from Farmerville, for allegedly “...failing to tag a turkey, intentional concealment of wildlife and criminal trespassing in Union Parish,” and Camden, Arkansas’ Justin Brummett, for hunting the proper licenses and tags in Claiborne Parish.
A major case was made on Donald Kellar, from Poplarville, Mississippi for allegedly hunting without licenses, taking over the daily and season limit of turkeys, hunting with an unplugged gun, criminal trespass and three counts of failing to tag turkeys in Washington Parish.
Fines for baiting, taking over the limit, using an unplugged shotgun and criminal trespass can run up to $500. The no-licenses fines are $350 for each offense with concealment of wildlife penalties up to $950 with various jail times added to the fines.