Hunting season opens in Georgia
It is the end of September, the lull of baseball season is finally winding down, the Braves are out of the playoff race, the Falcons lost their star quarterback, and the University of South Carolina has already ended University of Georgia’s football team the chance of another South Eastern Conference title. Besides sitting at home and watching the inevitable unfold before their eyes, Georgians don’t have a whole lot of entertainment to look forward to in the next few months.
However, if you are one of the 238,000 deer hunters in the state, your season just got started.
Sept. 8 marked the beginning of the 2007 whitetail deer season across the entire state. While the majority of hunters in Georgia hunt on private land, GCSU students need not despair, as they are privy to some of the best public hunting land in the country.
“I’ve killed deer at Rum Creek, Ocmulgee, and the Bond Swamp National Wildlife Refuge,” said Hunter Morgan of Fishing Creek Outfitters. “And my taxidermist killed a giant ten pointer right down the road at Cedar Creek.”
There are over 150,000 acres of public hunting land within an hour of Milledgeville and over 40,000 of them are within 25 minutes of campus. Some of these Wildlife Management Areas include Ocmulgee, Clark Hill, Oconee, Redlands and Cedar Creek. “Field and Stream” ranked the nearby Piedmont National Wildlife Refuge fifth on their list of top ten public hunting spots just last year.
“I like to go because it’s a great opportunity for me to study,” said senior Jennifer Harper. “I like to bring a book with me to read while I’m waiting, that way I don’t get bored or feel like I wasted my time.
So what if you don’t know anything about hunting? Well, even if you have never hunted a day in your life, don’t own any hunting equipment, or are somehow opposed to shooting your own food, the state’s management areas are a great place to camp out and fish
Even people who oppose hunting still find the spoils irresistible.
“I’m not into the whole hunting thing but I have eaten some deer burgers and they were pretty good,” said senior Shaun Lenderman. “I think people should only kill things for survival and not for fun, but if someone gave me some deer meat I would probably eat it again.”
Students who hunt save more money at the grocery store and eat healthier red meat than students who don’t. No matter where you shop in Milledgeville, you will pay more for ground beef than hunters do for ground deer, which is 20 percent leaner on average.
Whether it be for the love of the outdoors or the lack of entertainment, everyone should give hunting a chance. But before you rush out into the woods, make sure you take a free hunter’s safety course online or in person, and stop by a sporting goods store and pick up a license.
Public hunting locations can be found in the Georgia DNR hunting regulations manual or online at http://www.gohuntgeorgia.com/.
Posted by Colonnade Archives
on Sep 21 2007. Filed under Sports.
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