Deer Hunting Season Opens Saturday

For all of you heading to nature this weekend, be on alert because the firearm season for deer opens
Nov. 15 and extends to Nov. 25. I spoke with Ben Pryor, District Supervisor of the Protection Division
at the Missouri Department of Conservation office in Kirksville, and he advised that hikers and
nature lovers avoid forest land in Missouri during this time. If you do want to go out, he said
with a dubious tone, you should wear the hunter orange vest and hat that is mandatory for hunters.
Last year 470,557 people received firearm permits to hunt some of the one million deer that reside
in our fair state. Yes, 70% of Missourians may live in urban areas, but we rank fifth among states
for number of hunters. Pryor claimed that deer hunting generates $1.1 billion a year for the Missouri
economy when you add the fuel that hunters use to power up their trucks and ATVs to the more obvious
provisions like bullets, guns, beer, permits, lodging, food, beer, clothing, jerky, knives, beer, firewood,
muskets, blackpowder, beer.
I went to Truman State in Kirksville and believe me when I tell you that opening weekend for deer season
is like the Super Bowl, Easter, the Magna Carta, Mardi Gras, New Years Eve (again with the drinking) and
Christmas all wrapped into one for avid hunters. I was on the Missouriwhitetails.com forum today, looking at a post
asking if fellow deer hunters carry a sidearm (hand gun) while hunting. Under the member picture and name
is the mood description, and various people had moods ranging from the mundane "Hoping to get out and deer hunt" to
the anxious "1 Day Left to Stick an Arrow in a Deer" to the self deprecating "bitter and clingy" to the redneckish
"big buck ... come out come out wherever you are" to the downright perverse "rutting hard."
Deer collisions with cars pick-up during hunting season, but this could also be due to deer being much more
active in colder weather. Last season, for example, there was a drop in the number
of deer "bagged" in Missouri to 214,494 from 2006's 235,054 because 2007 was unseasonably warm.
The NYT has an article on muzzleloading hunting for deer. The muzzleloading season doesn't start
in Missouri until November 28. So when the semi-automatic rifles are put up on their racks on Nov. 25, do not
head directly out to the wilderness, hikers, because the musket balls will be flying until Dec. 8.