Ohio Division of Wildlife clarifies ambigous ODNR release on bringing back big game

An Ohio Department of Natural Resources press release omission could lead to confusion by Ohioans seeking to hunt big game in other states and then return with their trophies.

This uncertainty stems from a jumbled August 31st news release by the Natural Resources Department regarding new regulations intended to help curtail the spread of chronic wasting disease in Ohio’s white-tail deer herd.

While the rules focus in some measure on deer-kill reporting requirements in two Ohio counties where CWD was found in captive deer, the release also spends some time on what Ohio big-game hunters traveling out of state may do – and not do – in transporting their harvest back into the state.

“No person is permitted to bring or transport high-risk carcass parts of CWD-susceptible species into Ohio from any state or Canadian province, regardless of the CWD status of the exporting jurisdiction. Additional information on carcass regulations can be found at wildohio.gov.”

However, the issue is that the release does not specify which “parts,” nor does the reference link offer much in the way of an easy detouring route to an explanation. Such an important omission could be – and has been – construed to mean that a hunter returning to Ohio cannot bring back venison or a trophy head of a deer, moose, elk, caribou, or pronghorn antelope taken in a state known to be a venue of the highly contagious CWD.

That annotation now falls to the Ohio Division of Wildlife. In detailing what a successful Ohio hunter who traveled out of state can bring back the agency says that effective this past August 31st, returning Ohio hunters “must bone out the meat before returning to the state with an elk, mule deer, white-tailed deer, caribou, or moose.”

Also, only the following parts may be brought into Ohio, says the Wildlife Division:

Meat with no part of the spinal column or head attached;

Meat that is boned out, securely and completely wrapped either commercially or privately;

Cleaned hides with no heads attached;

Skull plates that have been cleaned of all meat and brain tissue;

Antlers with no meat or tissue attached;

Cleaned upper canine teeth;

Hides and capes without any part of the head or lymph nodes attached; or

Finished taxidermy mounts.

T

hese restrictions and requirements largely follow those of most every other state in what a hunter returning home have to follow.

John Windau – Wildlife Division spokesman – said his agency will be issuing additional information on this subject; a particularly vital one considering that the big-game hunting seasons elsewhere have all ready begun, particularly in the West.

- Jeffrey L. Frischkorn

JFrischk@Ameritech.net