Early Muzzleloader

As hunting is being bushwhacked from all sides, the last thing we need is controversy within the ranks.Yet bowhunters are fighting tokeep muzzleloaders from gaining a brief deer hunt in the midst of the long bow season.It was unsettling to witness a vigorous skirmish between the two interests as nearly 200 attended a Department of Natural Resources hearing on 1992 regulations here last week. Differences of opinion wereobvious among the many Carroll residents who attended this session, one of four statewide.

Maryland's Department of Natural Resources has completed its proposed hunting and trapping regulations for the 1994-1995 seasons. The proposal includes a three-day October muzzleloader season for deer.The muzzleloader season, which would run from Oct. 20-22, was discussed at public meetings held around the state in March.According to DNR, public responses in those meetings and written comments showed that about a third of those responding favored the muzzleloader season as proposed, a third wanted an early muzzleloader season on different dates and a third were not in favor of an early season.

Nearly a hundred area sportsmen attended the regiona Department of Natural Resources hunter hearing Tuesday evening at Manchester Elementary School.Each year the DNR is required to collect the public's comments on the coming season's proposed hunting and trapping regulations. After the DNR considers the comments, the year's regulations are formally set and announced, usually in late April or May.Unlike recent past hearings, this year's have been unexpectedly calm. Chalk this up to a proposal agenda that is little changed from last year's list of hunting changes and a new hearing format adopted last year that essentially changed the scope of the public hearing from individual comment to more of an exchange of ideas and group cooperation.

The start of 1994-95 deer hunting seasons are more than six months off, but the process that will determine how, when and where we will hunt whitetails and other game is about to begin in earnest.The Department of Natural Resources has released its proposed seasons, bag limits and regulations for upland and forest game and resident Canada geese, and the proposals include interesting changes -- most notable of which may well be a three-day muzzleloader season for deer in October.Other notable changes that have been proposed:* In all or parts of Garrett, Allegany, Washington and Frederick counties the take of antlerless deer will be restricted and the kill of antlered deer will be closely monitored through 1996 to ensure it does not exceed preset parameters.

Maryland's second two-week firearms season for deer, which closed Dec. 11, provided unusual conditions for hunters in the state, with three successive Saturdays of unusual weather.According to preliminary statistics from the Department of Natural Resources, the kill statewide was 1,552 below the record of 35,133 set last year, but the drop-offs seem to have occurred in the right areas of the state.Ed Golden, who heads the forest game program for DNR's Wildlife Division, said Thursday that the kill was up or about the same as last year "in all counties except the Western counties, and overall the firearms season went very well."

The Department of Natural Resources is set to propose an Oct. 21-23 muzzleloader deer hunt in addition to the regular mid-December hunt already in place, said Wildlife Director Josh Sandt."

March, that most dastardly of months, is upon us. I truly hate the month and wholly agree with humorist Pat McManus' view that "God invented March in case we should think that eternity was too short."March is too early for fishing, too late for hunting, too wet and too cold. About the only thing it's good for is remembering past casts and shots and planning for those to come.Speaking of planning for the months ahead, the Department of Natural Resources has proposed a number of changes to the new year's hunting regulations.

Maryland's three-day early muzzleloader hunting season for deer has grown in popularity over the past few years, and this year hunters will benefit from increased overall bag limits under the state's new deer management plan.The early season runs Thursday, Friday and Saturday."Muzzleloader bag limits have been modified to allow hunters to take more antlerless deer in sections of the state with growing or stable but high deer populations," said DNR Secretary John R. Griffin.The management plan, which was unveiled earlier this year, created four regions in the state and separate bag limits for each for bow, muzzleloader and firearms seasons.

Howard County's expanded deer hunt starts before dawn tomorrow, when hunters carrying muzzle-loading rifles are set to enter the woods at Columbia's western edge, set up their tree stands and wait. The first three days of the expanded hunt at the Middle Patuxent Environmental Area off Trotter Road are for hunters using only the old firearms technology. Muzzle-loader deer season begins statewide Thursday, state Department of Natural Resources officials said. "The idea is being out in the woods.

FINKSBURG -- The start of one of Maryland's most popular hunting seasons gave state wildlife managers their first look at the effects of a deadly virus on the white-tailed deer population. Biologists were at taxidermy and butcher shops yesterday for the first day of the two-day-early muzzleloader season to look at the health of deer and to ask hunters whether they have seen signs of epizootic hemorrhagic disease, a naturally occurring outbreak that happens every year on the East Coast.