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Open season on deer preparation
Twin Fawns
Twin fawns play along side a recently seal-coated road.
Jerry Davis, Columnist
Published: Jul 10, 2024, 8:00 PM

Heavy rains ended June and continued early July rutting country roads and lanes, tipping huge lowland Angelica plants, and sending corn head high camouflaging anything traveling among the stalks.

“One of the most noticed features from precipitation is the abundance and size of wildflowers, particularly in the prairies and along the roads,” said Doug Williams, at D W Sports Center in Portage, Wisconsin.  

Fern fronds have made deciduous forests look tropical.  Some potatoes, tomatoes, onions, squash, cucumbers and watermelons may slowed growth of edible plant organs and put the energy into more vegetative tissues.

Yellow coneflowers, purple beebalm, and milkweed are attracting bees, dragonflies, and butterflies while some oaks, apples, aspens, and black cherries dropped their idea of fall fruit to concentrate replacing caterpillar-eaten leaves.

White-tailed deer continue their rapid changes with fawns feeding, attractive coats appearing and fuzzy antlers elongating.  All deer are now dwarfed by maize.  

The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources is beginning to inform deer hunters, watchers, enthusiasts, farmers, and anyone else who is directly, indirectly, or inadvertently involved in the eight fall hunting seasons.  The early news centers on the animal, habitat, and disease, not the hunt itself.  This makes is even more useful for non-hunters, too. 

Understanding a little bit about deer and deer hunting will make understanding hunters and hunts much easier, safer, and enjoyable for all of us.

Realize first that deer and the eight seasons touch nearly everyone in some way, economically, recreationally, inconveniently, and being a spectator.  During the November season traffic crowds roads, phone lines, store aisles, state parks, convenience stores, bars, restaurants and public hunting grounds parking lots during peak hunting.  

The overload of early news releases is necessary to get it all in before that November event.  Just as important, there are things most hunters need to do to be ready with licenses, authorizations, equipment, clothing, land contacts, and vacation scheduling.

Non-hunting recreationists need to prepare, too.  Photographers and deer viewers in general are aware of summer coat color changes, antler growth, velvet shedding and the mating season when bucks appear almost anywhere, at any distance, and frequently in a driver’s headlights.

Dragonfly
A dragonfly, with interesting wing patches, appears to be ready for sunny days
Even now, deer carcasses are common along roads; fawns and adults.

These eight seasons extend from September 14 to January 31, 2025.  This 140-day span is an open season for archery and crossbow metro sub-units and counties with extended archery seasons.  Most seasons, however, are much shorter as with the two-day youth deer hunt and the granddaddy, a nine-day gun deer season, which this year is the latest it can possibly be by November’s calendar.

The general Archery and Crossbow (Sept. 14 - Jan. 5, 2025); Gun hunt for hunters with disabilities (Oct. 5 – 13); Youth deer hunt (Oct. 5 – 6); Gun hunt (Nov.23 – Dec. 1); Muzzleloader (Dec. 2 -11); 4-Day antlerless-only (Dec. 12 – 15); and Antlerless-only holiday hunt (Dec. 24 – Jan. 1) rounds out the list.

The WDNR overloads the internet with releases, so picking and choosing where and how you hunt and observation can focus interest and make choices easier.  A hunting regulations pamphlet and a game survey report will be released before the seasons commence. 

The term antlerless pops up regularly, which means any white-tailed deer with no antlers or neither antler three inches long or longer.  In other words, a buck deer has at least one antler that is three inches or longer in length.

As in past seasons, putting a “tag” on a deer is not required, but a printed authorization is used to declare the possession is legal. 

It’s not too early to purchase a license, according to Williams.  “Supplies, too, and it’s not a sales pitch, are going to run out and prices keep going up.”

An early WDNR release begins by informing the public, anyone interested in deer, and hunters and non-hunters, about deer population objectives across the state.  Every county has a deer advisory council to increase local involvement in deer management decisions.  

Deer enthusiasts may stay informed regarding research, which is discussed and reported from time to time on populations, the meaning of the sex-age-kill model used by population biologists, the winter severity index, surveys being conducted, health of the herd, and a stakeholder group that holds an open discussion with the DNR to brainstorm ideas in deer management.

This is enough to keep informing an inquiring mind towar Wisconsin’s state wildlife animal.

Insects continue to dominate, interfere, interest and dictate some activities.  Gnats, mosquitoes, dragonflies, butterflies, pollinators, disease vectors, biting and stinging bugs, and entertainers are in our lives.  

Michigan lily, large and small mushrooms, golf ball size walnuts, poisonous pokeweed, stickseed, ginseng fruit balls, rattlesnake plantain, and corn flowers are a few summer showoffs standing for attention.


Contact Jerry Davis, a freelance writer, at sivadjam@mhtc.net or 608.924.1112.
Spring turkey seasons began 43 years ago
Tom Turkeys
There is nothing prettier than a tom turkey coming to a turkey caller, unless it is two toms.
Jerry Davis, Columnist
Published: Mar 28, 2025, 4:48 PM

The last Wisconsin wild turkey was detected near Darlington, Wisconsin in Lafayette County in 1881.  

Things have certainly changed with the reintroduction of wild turkeys into Wisconsin ecosystems in 1976.  

Wisconsin’s modern day spring turkey season will open for the 43th time April 16, 2025, continuing a tradition that began in 1983.  This was a mire seven years after 29 Missouri hens and gobblers were released in Wisconsin’s Vernon County; a trade that sent ruffed grouse to Missouri in trade for these and other turkey releases that followed.

Turkey hunters, birders, and photographers say the Badger State got the better of the trade, which helped put Wisconsin on the map as a turkey hunter’s destination bringing hunters, and others, from as far away as Alabama to call to these spring gobblers.

Numerous other releases and relocations have helped push the Eastern wild turkey to all 72 Wisconsin counties.

The hunt is the prize jewel for many but other traditions have answered the call, too and continue to be a big part of celebrating this reintroduction.  What has not developed yet is a Thanksgiving Day hunt for the bird as table meat, even though an autumn season is open in some zones during the annual November nine-day, gun deer season. 

Talk of making the wild turkey the state’s game bird, along with the ruffed grouse, have not yet drawn attention of Wisconsin’s legislators.

The sale of bonus authorization permits is a tradition and challenge of sorts for some hunters.  The youth turkey hunt, April 12-13 this year, is another highlight with learn-to-hunt sessions and actual mentored hunts.  

Jeff Fredrick, of Mindoro, Wisconsin may be Wisconsin’s guru turkey geek, as his answering machine proclaims.

 He hunts, paints, photographs, and makes art of what’s left after all the meat is trimmed.  The feathers become decoys and other works of art.

“The sale of bonus authorizations always got me so worked up and anxious that I scheduled my Wyoming and Montana turkey hunts to conflict with Wisconsin’s period C so I didn’t wait in line only to find out those for Period C were all sold out,” Fredrick said.  “I purchased a first season in Minnesota, got second period with my patron license, bought a Period D, and my son and daughter each have an authorization, too”.

Each year bonus authorizations are available until they are all sold.  Zone A has permits for periods D, E, and F, as does Zone 3.  Zone 2 has Period F remaining.

Licenses cost $15 and $65 for residents and nonresidents, respectively.  In addition, a turkey stamp costs $5.25, which is good for both spring and fall hunting, even though separate licenses are needed.

Generally, about 40,000 turkeys are registered each spring season.  The record number of birds; 52,880 were registered in 2008.  Compare that to 1983 when 1,200 hunters registered 182 birds during the first modern day spring season.

Turkey hunting seminars, calling contests, new clothing, calling devices, and even a challenging shotgun, the .410, and heavy shot loads have arisen, as well as turkey camps patterned after Wisconsin’s November deer camps.

Several southwest communities claim to be Wisconsin’s turkey hunting capital including Romance, Wisconsin near where the first Missouri birds flew from crates; and Boscobel, Wisconsin, a rural community that was one of the first in-person registration stations for hunters.

Wayne Smith, of Blanchardville, Wisconsin shot his first turkey during Wisconsin’s second hunt, 1984.  

“I borrowed an old slate call from a buddy, used a face paint kit, an old camouflage jacket, and a 12-gauge shotgun, not camouflaged.  I heard a gobble at about 300 yards and began calling.  The bird as I recall came in silent and I shot him and went straight to work at Madison Silo Company after that,” Smith said.  “There isn’t anything prettier than a strutting gobbler coming in to your calls.  It’s a lot like deer hunting but there you hope someone sends a deer your way.  In turkey hunting you are coaxing the gobble to come to you.”

Fredrick believes he was fortunate growing up with the new game in town at that time.  “We knew very little about spring turkey hunting,” he said.

“My father is a taxidermist and he used to sponsor a class for area taxidermists to learn mounting techniques.  One of the instructors was from the South and I’d listen to him tell stories about turkey hunting, which got me interested and started.”

Fredrick believes his growing up with turkey hunting starting in Wisconsin gave him a perspective few people ever experienced and never will in the future.

Doug Williams, at D W Sports Center in Portage believes turkey hunting has become a way of life for some hunters.  “There is nothing like a gobbler gobbling, the woods coming to life in spring, and all the different animals and plants coming back from dormancy of just surviving winter.”

It’s just a great day to be alive and in the woods, many an old-timer and first-time hunters say.


Contact Jerry Davis, a freelance writer at sivadjam@mhtc.net or 608.924.1112