Department of Conservation makes several changes to deer hunting regulations

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

Several changes are coming to the “Wildlife Code of Missouri” for this upcoming deer season, the Missouri Department of Conservation announced in a Monday press release.

Among those changes includes reduced antlered buck limits for nonresidents from two to one. The release says nonresident deer hunters in the state have increased nearly 50% in the past 10 years “and there has been an increasing number of resident hunters who have expressed concern about the impacts to land access and their hunting experiences.”

The youth portion of deer season was moved up a week to Oct. 24 and 25 “to help avoid conflicts with Halloween activities at the end of October,” the release says.

Also, the antler-point restriction was removed for the 18 counties who most-recently put it in place, the release says. MDC also removed designation of chronic wasting disease management zones. The CWD portion of firearms season was also removed “to simplify the structure of the season while not significantly affecting deer harvest,” per the release.

The mandatory CWD sampling during the opening weekend of firearms season will become a four-year county rotation, making sampling “be conducted in every county of the state once every four years,” per the release. This season it will be conducted in 28 counties on Nov. 14 and 15.

Placing feed and mineral for deer has been banned in counties close where CWD has been detected, the release says. Additional, the minimum acreage requirement for CWD management permits has increased to 20 continuous acres and the application process has been simplified, according to the release.

The release also says targeted deer removals will not occur after the season ends.