Wisconsin’s Spring Conservation Hearings Set for April 14

   Should white deer be fair game for hunters?

   Should monitoring your trapline from afar with cellular trail cameras qualify as an “in-person” checks?

   Should the inland trout season open at 5 a.m. on the first Saturday in April, a month earlier than its usual opener?

   Should motor-trolling with three lines be expanded to include Lincoln, Sawyer, Sheboygan and Waupaca counties; leaving only Iron, Vilas, Forest, Oneida and Florence as the final counties restricting motor-trollers to one line?

   Those are four of 74 proposals awaiting review by hunters, anglers, trappers and other outdoor recreationists in mid-April at Wisconsin’s spring conservation hearings. In-person meetings in all 72 county seats will be held the night of April 14 for those wishing to ask questions and mark paper ballots. Meanwhile, online voting (On the DNR's website) begins April 14 at 7 p.m. and ends April 16 at 6 p.m.

   Doors open for in-person meetings at 6 p.m., with presentations beginning at 6:30 p.m. Hit this link (specific location details are available online) for the location in your county. Elections for WCC delegates begin at 7 p.m., with at least two seats open in each county. Discussions and votes on the proposed rules and local resolutions follow.

   These annual hearings are held jointly by the Department of Natural Resources and Wisconsin Conservation Congress. The WCC, now in its 91st year, is a 360-person citizens group comprised of five delegates from each county. The group is legislatively sanctioned to advise Wisconsin’s seven-citizen Natural Resources Board, which sets DNR policy.

Rather than drag out the entire deer, Wisconsin hunters would be allowed to bone out their kill and pack out just the meat under a proposal scheduled for April’s statewide conservation hearings. — Patrick Durkin photo

   The statewide hearings began in the 1930s when UW-Madison wildlife professor Aldo Leopold and his contemporaries sought to engage the public in conservation decision-making. Each year since, citizens have offered and voted on proposals that can eventually become laws regulating hunting, fishing, trapping and the environment.

   To read all 74 proposals and background information on this year’s questionnaire, hit this link (https://dnr.wisconsin.gov/sites/default/files/topic/About/WCC/2025/2025_Spring_Hearing_Questionnaire.pdf). The questionnaire starts with 43 proposed DNR rule changes, 39 that deal with local, regional and statewide fishing regulations. The final 31 questions are for advice only; 28 from the WCC and three from the NRB.

   Long-existing laws require Wisconsin trappers to check most traps at least once every 24 hours in person. Other states waive in-person checks if trappers can monitor their sets remotely with cellular trail cameras. The Wisconsin Trappers Association, however, opposed that idea in a vote at its annual convention in mid-March. Most trappers seem to agree with the WTA vote.

   “The essence of trapping is dedicating time and hard work to outsmarting the animal,” said trapping instructor Skye Defourneaux of Neillsville. “Checking your traps from home seems no different than shooting deer from the window of your truck. I also worry what would happen if the (trail camera) malfunctioned the day a senator’s dog runs off and gets caught in a trap, and you don’t show up to release it because everything looks fine on your screen at home.”

   Others worry that remote monitoring could encourage trappers to put too much distance between themselves and their traps. “Let’s say a guy sets a bobcat trap in northern Wisconsin, and then drives home to Milwaukee,” said Mike Wilhite, owner/editor of the Trappers Post magazine in Scandinavia. “What if the trap catches something, but the camera’s picture doesn’t show what happened, and the animal jumped to the side, out of sight of the camera? Will that guy drive five hours back up north to verify nothing’s in the trap? When I take my coyote-trapping trip up north each fall, I stay a week so I can check my traps daily.”

   The DNR is also asking hunters to approve plans to extend the fall turkey season to the Sunday nearest Jan. 6 for zones 6 and 7 in the Northwoods. The season currently closes the Friday before Thanksgiving for those zones.

   The DNR is also asking if hunters should be allowed to butcher their deer where it falls, and leave the bones behind when packing out the meat. That’s common practice when hunters kill deer, elk or bears in Western states.

   Rob Bohmann, Racine, is chair of the WCC, and helped champion several advisory questions on this year’s questionnaire. For instance, he thinks the DNR’s law-enforcement bureau should have a K9 team in each of the agency’s five regional districts. Bohmann said 37 states have K9 teams to help conservation wardens find bodies, spent shells, missing evidence and marijuana patches.

   Bohmann also thinks Wisconsin should quit protecting white deer, which have become common in parts of Wood, Portage, Jefferson, Marathon and Winnebago counties. These deer aren’t albinos. Unlike most deer, whose coats change from gray to rust to brown with the seasons, some deer genetically produce a white color phase.

   “We hear from more people every year who seldom see normal color deer where they hunt,” Bohmann said. “There’s no good reason to protect these deer, especially in areas with chronic wasting disease. White deer can spread CWD just as well as any brown deer.”

   Rule changes approved statewide at the hearings advance to the NRB for final review. If the Board approves them, too, they could take effect in 2026. Advisory questions OK’d this year could advance for a second review at next year’s hearings.

   The April14 hearings don’t include questions and discussions about antlerless quotas and deer-management objectives. Those issues will be addressed by County Deer Advisory Committee at meetings starting April 21. Hit this link for times and locations for each CDAC meeting (2025 CDAC meeting schedule [PDF]).