Ohio Poacher Pays Big, CWD Research Continues, and More Deer Hunting News

Pennsylvania’s flintlock muzzleloader hunt — the only dedicated flintlock season in the country — is underway, but questions about its future have arisen. Photo by Jim Cumming.

AN ACCIDENT THAT SHOULD NEVER HAPPEN

Louisiana law-enforcement agents responded Dec. 23 to a shooting involving two hunters in Zachary, a city in East Baton Rouge Parish. The hunters were unknowingly hunting deer on the same small private property when one hunter mistook the other for a deer and accidentally shot him with a 20-gauge and buckshot.

The shooter immediately called 911 for help when he realized he had shot a man and not a deer. The wounded hunter was airlifted to a hospital in Baton Rouge with non-fatal injuries.

As a reminder to all of us, the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries reiterates the importance of hunting and firearms safety — especially knowing your target.

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PENNSYLVANIA’S 51ST FLINTLOCK MUZZLELOADER HUNT UNDERWAY

Bob Frye, a spokesman for the Pennsylvania Game Commission, told Go Erie, “I think there are 44 states in the country that have (special) big-game muzzleloader seasons, and Pennsylvania is the only one that is dedicated strictly to flintlocks. It’s really one of a kind across the whole country. That makes it special, and that makes it something we would like to see continue in that manner.”

But will the 51-year-old flint-on-steel season stay ultra-primitive statewide?

In what is sure to be highly controversial, especially with older Boomer hunters, the Pennsylvania Board of Game Commissioners has floated a proposal to allow any muzzleloading firearm to be used on properties enrolled in the Deer Management Assistance Program during future flintlock deer seasons. Stay tuned.

YOU KNOW THE NO. 1 STATE FOR BOWHUNTING WHITETAILS?

In a shocker, at least for me, the National Deer Association reports that New Jersey leads the country in the percentage of total deer harvest by archers at 65%, and there isn’t really a close second. Because New Jersey is one of the most urbanized states in the nation, firearms seasons are short and geographically limited, and in about two-thirds of the state, bow season is open continuously for five months. Also, New Jersey DEP Fish and Wildlife focuses outreach efforts in urban and suburban communities to increase archery hunting in areas that need deer management, especially the harvest of more does.

SHOULD YOU EAT A DEER WITH CWD?

In a recent experiment at Rocky Mountain Laboratories in Montana, scientists tried to contaminate human cerebral organoids, or tissues that closely resemble human brain tissue, with injections of chronic wasting disease, which has infected deer in 35 states and five Canadian provinces.

For a week, the researchers exposed the imitation brain tissues to high concentrations of CWD from three sources. Good news. In continuing testing, there has been no infection. That’s another scientific finding that CWD does not jump from an infected animal to a human.

Does this mean it’s OK to eat a deer you just shot that tested positive for CWD? No, researchers say, because the imitation tissue samples they tried to infect are not precisely the same as real human brain tissue. Yet more research is needed.

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OHIO POACHER TO PAY RECORD FINE

On Dec. 12, Christopher J. Alexander, 28, of Wilmington, Ohio, was sentenced in Clinton County Common Pleas Court for unlawfully shooting a trophy white-tailed buck in November 2023.

Alexander was sentenced to pay the maximum restitution for the 18-point trophy buck — $35,071.73, the largest restitution value for a white-tailed deer in Ohio’s history. Alexander was also sentenced to complete five years of community control and serve six months at STAR Community Justice Center, a locked-down community-based correctional facility. He received a 10-year hunting license revocation and forfeited all property seized as evidence, including the trophy deer’s antlers. Finally, he was ordered to pay $1,000 in fines, $1,000 to the Turn In a Poacher program, $2,000 in restitution to media outlets, and all court costs.

The takeaway: Poaching doesn’t pay, unless you want to go to jail and empty your bank account.