Quote:
Originally Posted by grizzon30s
I'm just saying, can u say that every year that ducks will be on the coast during the 2nd week of november? Absolutely not. Look at how they set shrimping seasons. They take data from sample trauls then open the season when the shrimp are of size and running. Seems like we could do that with waterfowl.
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Unfortunately, no. Waterfowl hunting regulations require federal approval. What we set at the August meeting goes to the USFWS for publication in the Federal Register and a public comment period before getting final approval the last week in September, before the first state in the Flyway can open a season. So even if all states didn't have to submit seasons at the same time, there is at least a 6-week lag-time for federal approval by law.
And we are going to begin setting seasons even earlier.
The Canadians, for example, set their season dates for the upcoming hunting season last October.
Starting next year, we will be transitioning into a system that uses prior-year data to set the waterfowl hunting season. We don't yet know exactly what it's going to look like, but we will probably set the seasons at the March Commission meeting instead of August starting in 2016.