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(Provided by MDNR)
Conservation officers with the Michigan DNR urge deer hunters to engage in an ethical hunt: Buy a license before going out and don't loan kill tags.
Every deer hunting season, DNR conservation officers encounter people engaged in unethical hunting practices. These officers tackle many cases of hunters buying hunting licenses after harvesting deer or loaning kill tags to friends or relatives.
"Each year, we see cases of individuals waiting to buy licenses until after they have shot a deer," said Dean Molnar, assistant chief of the DNR's Law Enforcement Division. "We remind all hunters that you must buy your license before you go out to hunt and have it in your possession when afield. Buying a license is not only the ethical and responsible thing to do, it is the law. Harvesting a deer without a license is poaching."
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Kalamazoo River Project Targets Spawning SturgeonRecently an excavator was moving rock out into the middle of the Kalamazoo River in southwest Michigan. An interested angler stopped to ask the crew what was going on.
"I told him we're building a spawning riffle for lake sturgeon," said Jay Wesley, Lake Michigan Basin Coordinator for the DNR. "That's a place where adult lake sturgeon can deposit their eggs. The eggs fall into the crevices of the rock and protect them against predators and turbulent flows."
The Kalamazoo River sturgeon riffle is approximately 26 miles upstream from Lake Michigan and 800 feet downstream of Allegan Dam. It is made of 4- to 24-inch field stone that is placed across the river. The overall size of the riffle is 22,400 square feet - about half the size of a football field.
The project was made possible by a $200,000 contribution from Consumers Energy and a $190,000 Great Lakes Tribal Coastal Grant provided to the Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Band of Pottawatomi Indians (also known as the Gun Lake Tribe). The project features numerous partners; including the DNR's Parks and Recreation Division and Allegan Heavy Equipment Crew, Stantec (provided design) and Grand Valley State University (providing monitoring).
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Agreement Provides $550,000 for Pheasant Habitat in SW Michigan
The Michigan DNR is partnering with Enbridge Energy Partners, L.P. and Pheasants Forever in an agreement that will see Enbridge provide half a million dollars for pheasant habitat restoration in Michigan.
Improvement projects are scheduled to take place over the next three years in various areas in Michigan, focused on Michigan Pheasant Restoration Initiative priority landscapes and oak savanna restoration.
"This partnership allows the parties involved to work together cooperatively, producing significant habitat improvements for wildlife and the betterment of upland game hunting opportunities," said DNR Director Keith Creagh.
In 2013, Enbridge replaced a 30-inch pipeline, which runs for about two miles across the Crane Pond State Game Area in Cass County. As a result of the permitting process, the DNR and Enbridge worked together to improve the pipeline infrastructure and restore and improve habitat impacted during construction.
Enbridge transports, generates and distributes energy, employing more than 11,000 workers, mostly in the U.S. and Canada.
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85% of Michigan’s Early Season Elk Hunters SuccessfulThe Michigan DNR announced that Michigan's first elk hunt of 2016, which ended Oct. 3, had a hunter success rate of 85 percent. One hundred state hunters had 12 days to fill their elk license, with 30 any-elk and 70 antlerless-only licenses issued.
"It's hard to believe the first hunt period is in the books," said DNR wildlife biologist Jennifer Kleitch. "Overall, we had good weather to hunt, no notable law issues and good success. The last few days were the wettest, which slowed efforts just a bit."
The first hunt period of the elk season is staggered and open for a total of 12 days, from Aug. 30-Sept. 2, Sept. 16-19 and Sept. 30-Oct. 3. This early hunt period is open only in areas outside the core elk range, helping to control the distribution or locations of elk. The management goal for elk hunting is to control the number of elk and their locations and also the herd composition, or the male-to-female ratios. Hunt period 1 targets elk outside the location where the DNR wants the majority of the population to be.
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DNA Test Cougars Killed in the Upper Peninsula
Genetic testing on tissue samples from two cougars poached in the Upper Peninsula shows the two animals likely came from a population found generally in South Dakota, Wyoming and northwest Nebraska.
"This genetic research lines up with what we've presumed previously, that cougars found in the Upper Peninsula are males dispersing from this population east of the Rocky Mountains," said Kevin Swanson, a Michigan Department of Natural Resources wildlife management specialist with the agency's Bear and Wolf Program. "These males dispersed from the main population are looking to establish new territories."
Since 2008, the DNR has confirmed 35 cougar reports in the Upper Peninsula, but so far there remains no conclusive evidence of a breeding population. No reports have been confirmed from Lower Michigan.
Cougars are an endangered species in Michigan protected by law.
The U.P. cougar confirmations were derived from trail camera video, photographs, tracks, scat or in the case of the two males poached, carcasses.