Thursday, February 12, 2009
Bill Cochran's Mailbag: Of tree huggers and deer
Bill Cochran is a Roanoke Times outdoors columnist.
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BILL: I am an avid reader of your column each week and want to take the time to thank you for keeping the outdoorsmen updated on events taking place. By reading your column is the only way I was able to find out about the National Forest planning meeting in Woodstock. Myself and several of my hunting friends decided to attend because we all are very concerned over the drastic decrease in the number of deer in the forest.
I was extremely disappointed in the meeting. The few hunters in the group were badly outnumbered by tree huggers -- nature loving environmentalists. If they all got their way there would never be another tree harvested in the National Forest. It appears they are slowly getting their wish, since there is a proposal to establish several thousand more acres of wilderness.
It seems like every time at the meeting the subject of improving wildlife habitat was mentioned the subject was quickly changed back to protecting the forest by a non-hunter. After attending this meeting, all I can say is the future of the whitetail deer in Virginia’s National Forest would appear to be very bleak.
STEVE WILL
Mount Crawford
BILL: I am looking at the flounder regulations in your stuff and the first and third options are the same except for the size difference. Is this correct? It would be much better to have a 17.5 inch and three per person limit.
P.C.
P.C.: What you read is correct. Virginia’s recreational flounder fishing options are as follows:
A. 19-inch minimum size, five per day, no closed season.
B. 18.5-inch minimum size, five per day, closed July 21-Aug. 3 or two weeks during May 1-June 30.
C. 18.5-inch minimum size, five per day and no closed season.
Not much choice, is it? I’m going to guess most people will go with Option C while wishing that the minimum size were lower. While an 18.5-size limit would be better than last year’s 19 inches, many anglers thought it might even be lower considering that Virginia was 33 percent under quota in 2008 and can increase this year’s catch by 41 percent.
In comparison, North Carolina was 42.6 percent under quota last season and is being offered options with a size limit as little as 14 inches.
If you care to make your option choice known to the Virginia Marine Resources Commission, you can do so by e-mailing Jack Travelstead.
BILL
