Fisher sightings in Northeast Ohio may be vanguard to species return to state

The high probability of a recent fisher sighting in Northeast Ohio may prove an indicators of the species’ natural recovery back into the region.

Several weeks ago a trail camera set up along the East Branch of the Chagrin River in Lake County captured the image of what’s believed to be a fisher. 

The trail camera was set up on private land near the massive Holden Arboretum, which is established in Lake County’s Kirtland City, Kirtland Hills Village, and Geauga County’s Chardon Township.

Due to the Arboretum and the area’s extensive large wooded home sites, the general area is much less developed than surrounding neighborhoods.

Perhaps not surprisingly it is also the same remote and rugged river corridor frequented by black bears – typically young males – being dispersed. This, following expulsion by their mothers from their haunts in northwest Pennsylvania.

And biologists with both the Ohio Division of Wildlife and the Pennsylvania Game Commission believe that fishers are experiencing the same expansive strategy.

Fishers were lost to Ohio sometime during the mid-1800s; the great extirpation period that saw wolves, black bears, elk and other species disappear from the state.

While the wild turkey, white-tailed deer, river and otters and others have returned either naturally or with human reintroduction efforts, some species are doing so at a much slower rate. Among them are black bears and fishers; a large member of the weasel family that can weight up to 13 pounds with males and up to six pounds with females.

Officially in Ohio, fishers are listed as both “extirpated” (meaning having disappeared from a particular part of their range) as well as a “species of special interest.”

By Ohio law, they cannot be trapped and if caught, they must be released.

Yet it appears back to Ohio the fishers will almost certainly come to stay, biologists are speculating.

“It does and it does not surprise me,” said Katie Dennison, the Wildlife Division’s fur-bearer biologist on the likely recent fisher sighting in Lake County.

To illustrate the infrequency of fisher sightings in Ohio, Dennison said since 2013 the Wildlife Division has confirmed only eight of them.

“But five of those have occurred within the past two years, including one sighting by our wildlife officer in Ashtabula County,” Dennison said.

In fact, of the eight sightings, one-half happened last year, with all but one occuring in Ashtabula County.

Which most certainly does not shock Dennison. Nor does it particularly startle Aaron Facka, Dennison’s counterpart with the Pennsylvania Game Commission.

“Ten years ago our fisher population was centered in the north-central part of the state, and around the Allegheny National Forest. Now they’re everywhere in Pennsylvania except for the urban areas of Philadelphia and Pittsburgh,” Facka said.

That expansion includes what the Game Commission designates as its Wildlife Management Unit 1B, consisting primarily of Pennsylvania's Crawford County, which is Ashtabula County’s nextdoor neighbor.

And while in 2019 about 700 fishers were recorded as being legally trapped in all of Pennsylvania, fully 150 of these animals were taken in Unit 1B, also said Facka.

“Expansion took off after 2004 but has slowed some since,” Facka said.

Both Facka and Dennison believe that what is happening in Northeast Ohio is that natural dispersal of young males striking out on their own and looking to stake a claim elsewhere.

Strong evidence of that belief is partly rooted in knowing that the two roadkill fishers collected since 2013 and examined by the Wildlife Division were both young males, Dennison said.

Both fur-bearer biologists say too that the habitat and available prey base – which includes squirrels, rabbits and birds besides porcupines which are vacant from Ohio – exists in sufficient quantities to attract dispersed fishers.

“If all you have are young males and the females are back in Pennsylvania, the males will go back there to mate but will return to where they were,” Facka also said.

Meaning, Northeast Ohio.

“I suspect you’ll see a breeding population sooner or later,” Facka said as well.

All of which excites Dennison, knowing that after a nearly 200-year absence Ohio might very well provide a homecoming for the shy and reclusive fisher.

“We are asking the public that if they do have a fisher sighting to report it to our wildohio.com web site,” Dennison said. “If we start to receive more reported sightings than we can do more research and possibly even conduct a reintroduction program.”

- Jeffrey L. Frischkorn

JFrischk@Ameritech.net

JFrischk4@gmail.com

Upcoming trail dates set for two accused in Hocking Hills State Park death

The case against two Hocking County youths alleged to have caused the September 2nd, 2019 death 44-year-old Chillicothe photographer Victoria Shafer at Hocking Hills State Park is making its way through the court system.

Jaden W. Churchheus and Jordan A. Buckley, both of Hocking County’s Logan, have been charged with murder, which is an Unclassified Felony punishable by up to life in prison.

Some of details of the September 2nd incident allege the two youths caused a 74-pound, six-foot long log to strike and kill Shafer. Shafer was at the park in order to take graduation photographs of several area students, none of whom were injured during the alleged incident.

Investigators with the Ohio Department of Natural Resources and the Hocking County Sheriffs Office allege Schafer was standing about 75 feet below and on a staircase at Old Man’s Cave, located within 2,356-acre Hocking Hills State Park, when she was killed instantly by the log.

Investigators allege the log was removed from a pile about 40 feet from the ledge, which was above a second ledge before the final drop to where Shafer is said to have been, a Hocking County assistant prosecutor later said.

The Hocking County assistant prosecutor also said later that a video of testimony taken by investigators alleges that Churchhouse flipped the log over a downed tree while Buckley is alleged to have pushed the log.

As far as where the case now stands, Hocking County prosecutor Benjamin E. Fickel did not respond to repeated inquiries into the status of the cases against the two accused.

However, a review of the Hocking County Clerk of Court’s records shows that for accused Churchheus a January 27th trail before Hocking County Common Pleas Court Judge John T. Wallace is designated as “event canceled.” But a new jury conference before Judge Wallace is tentatively set for March 3rd with a jury trail date tentatively set for March 16th though 20th, also before Judge Wallace.

In accused Buckley’s case, the Clerk of Court’s records show a jury trial was set for February 3rd before Judge Wallace and is marked “event continued.” Meanwhile a “motion to suppress hearing” before Judge Wallace is now tentatively set for March 5th.

- Jeffrey L. Frischkorn

JFrischk@Ameritech.net

JFrischk4@gmail.com

Unsavory conduct closes popular Lower Grand River (Ohio) steelhead fishing hole

Just at the cusp of Northeast Ohio’s spring steelhead fishing season, anglers have lost a popular – and productive – angling location on the lower Grand River in Lake County.

Blame poor behavior by anglers as the reason behind the closure.

Now off limits is what local anglers have long referred to as the “Asphalt Plant Hole.” The name is in reference to a now-deceased asphalt manufacturing plant. This site is located off Fairport-Nursery Road (Ohio Route 535) just west of Mantle Road in Painesville Township.

Though located entirely on private property, the site has long enjoy an “open fishing” status with little complaints from previous owners. There, steelhead anglers would fish for trout hovering in the hole’s deep and long stretch, awaiting to make their spawning runs further upstream.

It had proven enormously popular with both fly fishers along with bait anglers who often used it as a way point to fishing upstream toward the Ohio Route 2 bridge.

The Asphalt Plant Hole also is one of several other choice steelhead, smallmouth bass, spring river-spawning walleye and even muskie fishing spots in the lower Grand River. This stretches runs for several miles between the Route 2 bridge and downstream to the North St. Clair Street bridge in Fairport Harbor.

This entire distance is found exclusively within private property with angling access ebbing and flowing according to the wishes – or indifference - of current property owners.

However, Wildlife Division law enforcement officials say the latest closure at the Asphalt Plant Hole came about due to several unsavory and recent incidents.

Among them were anglers caught urinating while standing in the river and in front of a father-daughter duo who had obtained actual permission to fish there, said a Wildlife Division law enforcement official who requested anonymity.

The Wildlife Division officer said also the person hired to watch over the property encountered the gutted carcasses of steelhead, perhaps the result of fishers catching female trout for their roe but then leaving the rest behind.

Consequently, the law enforcement officer said, the Wildlife Division has been instructed to begin issuing “trespassing” citations to person caught angling at the Asphalt Plant Hole.

Asked about the rest of the lower Grand River between the Route 2 bridge and the North St. Clair Street bridge, the Wildlife Division law enforcement officer said the agency has not yet been contacted by any other landowner to begin enforcing the state’s no trespassing law.

“If we do get complaints than we will have to close off the fishing and start issuing tickets,” the Wildlife Division officer said.

Lake Metroparks does own and maintain several nearby sites that offer free, good public access to the lower Grand River. Among them is the agency’s Grand River Landing, Beaty Landing, and Helen Hazen Wyman Park. And the city of Painesville also has its Kiwanis Recreation Park.

See www.lakemetroparks.com as well as www.painesville.com.

- Jeffrey L. Frischkorn

JFrischk@Ameritech.net

JFrischk4@gmail.com

Ohio's coyote hunting proposal shelved - for now, anyway

Smarting from being at the receiving end of heavy flack against its proposal to establish a season on the taking of coyotes, the Ohio Division of Wildlife has bailed out on the matter.

At least for now, anyway.

“We are pausing the coyote proposal while we gather more input,” said Kendra Wecker, chief of the Wildlife Division in an e-mail to “Ohio Outdoor News.”

Wecker went on to say the agency has received “several suggestions we need to explore before filing an official proposal.”

“The filing deadline is (February 21st) for this rule package, and I don’t want to rush any changes, Wecker said.

Thus, Wecker said also, “we will prepare a revised proposal for this summer.”

“We are listening and appreciate the interest and dialog on coyotes,” she said.

Wecker did not respond to a request for expansion or clarification of her remarks.

The affair to establish a season on coyotes was inserted as part of a January 15th set of proposals for small-game and waterfowl hunting to the eight-member Ohio Wildlife Council, which approves such matters.

Along with the proposed season was a requirement that anyone hunting coyotes – including individuals who might opportunistically want to kill one while hunting deer or some other species – would first need to buy a fur-takers/trapping permit.

Agreeing the matter deserves further review is Jim Samuel of Adams County and one of the Council’s members.

“This is an example of how the process works,” Samuel told “Ohio Outdoor News. “A proposal is brought by the Division of Wildlife, feedback is received and then things happen.”

Opposition quickly arose, however. Advocates against the proposal said the Wildlife Division poorly vetted the matter, failing to adequately consult with hunting groups but rather looking at trappers almost exclusively.

The parent Ohio Department of Natural Resources also came under further criticism for its poorly worded January 16^th press release. This document jumbled run-on sentences that blended coyote trapping requirement proposals with proposed coyote hunting requirements.

So severe was the overall appraisal of the agency’s coyote proposal that a change.org petition was started. In just a few weeks this petition had collected 27,000 or so signatures in opposition to the Wildlife Division’s coyote proposal.

Among those opposed to the Wildlife Division’s coyote proposal is the powerful Ohio Farm Bureau.

In a February 18th update to a February 5^th statement, the group’s director of livestock, Roger High said:

“The Ohio Department of Natural Resources’ proposal to restrict coyote trapping dates would create an undue burden on Ohio’s poultry and livestock farmers.

“The inability to properly control coyotes by trapping during calving, lambing and kidding could very well cause livestock and poultry farmers whose production system is primarily pasture-based to be at risk of higher losses due to coyotes.”

Consequently, the Wildlife Division backtracked and now has temporarily anyway, put the issue on hold.

Which, even Samuel says, is not a bad thing. Even though while much of the feedback was negative more than some was positive in favor of the proposal, resulting in “strong opinions” on both sides, Samuel said.

“I’m not going to second guess the Division,” Samuel said also.

“I will say this, though, from all of the positions on the issue I have heard, almost everyone has a recommendation as to how (the proposal) could be better or different, and for that reason it was good to pull the proposal and get more input,” Samuel said.

According to the Natural Resources Department, a statewide hearing on all proposed rules will be held at the Division of Wildlife’s District One office on March 25th at 9 a.m. The office is located at 1500 Dublin Road, Columbus.

- Jeffrey L. Frischkorn

JFrischk@Ameritech.net

JFrischk4@gmail.com

 

Time to find compromise on Ohio's coyote season-license proposal

Trying to find compromise – concessions by each side – in the proposal to require coyote hunters to also obtain a trapping license may have breached the discord surrounding the subject.

If so, than the rancor, confusion, and mistrust circling the proposal is at an end.

Even so, nothing is written in fine print, let alone, stone. Consequently, the Ohio Division of Wildlife can move out of its corner and toward a middle ground.

Until it does, however, the whole cloth needs looking at with a jaundiced eye.

What the agency is proposing is that coyote hunters – not just trappers - first buy a trapping tag before shooting an animal.

Yes, I now, the agency insists that it is really a “fur-taker” permit. In truth, however, something on the order of 75 percent of the licenses issued are believed to find their way into the wallets of trappers - not hunters - who pursue raccoons, fox and the like.

Fact is, “fur-taker permit” is one of those journalistic sour-lemon-tasting euphemisms on the order of “harvest” instead of “kill.” Or “antlerless permit” instead of “doe tag.” But I digress.

The agency’s proposal also calls for a season on the trapping of coyotes to align with that of other “fur-bearers” which are trapped, namely raccoons and fox.

Before a compromise can be reached it is important to note as well the Wildlife Division bungled this affair from the get-go. This, in a similar fashion to the Wildlife Division’s premature launch of a bobcat season in 2018.

The agency’s press release on the coyote proposal was a mush-mash of information. The document’s poorly worded paragraph featuring the matter was condensed into a sentence that melded hunting with trapping; the run-on lead failing to separate the two subjects.

Then too, the paragraph continued by noting a season for trapping but neglecting to specifically exclude the information that it does not apply to hunting. Again, here is where two short sentences instead of one poorly written would have better served the reader.

Far worse is the manner in which the Wildlife Division came up with the proposal. It never mentions they were really the offspring of the state’s trappers. Thus the agency failed to appreciate and understand that hunters needed to be brought into the loop before – and not, after – the proposal was launched. In effect, the Wildlife Division blind-sided those to whom the proposals would most impact: coyote hunters

In short, this proposal was inadequately vetted. In much the same manner the Wildlife Division groped about with the 2018 bobcat season scheme.

Yet the proposal is not without merit. For this reason it is salvageable. With concessions and with compromise, certainly.

Clearly someone who shoots coyotes with the intent of selling their hide ought to pay something for that activity. Just as do those who hunt raccoons, fox and the like.

Even so, a person sitting in a deer stand or blind, participating in a deer drive, or waiting for a woodchuck to appear on the edge of a cut hay field ought not to face a fine for taking the incidental coyote.

If one shoots a coyote and keeps it for personal use; a mount, a rug, or whatever that individual ought not to have to buy an additional license. Yes, even if the Wildlife Division bays at the moon how trapping license sales have taken a 41-percent nosedive over the past 10 years.

A possible solution here features the idea that if a person brings a coyote pelt into a licensed fur-trader/buyer than that individual must also show he possesses a trapping license.

As for landowners who trap or shoot coyotes on their own property, handle that matter the same way the taking of deer, beaver, otter, and whatever is handed now.

The season thing is a bit more tricky. While the Wildlife Division is recommending coyote trappers observe a season, no such demand is being asked of hunters. Hunters therefore could still shoot coyotes all year long.

Some trappers might argue this compromise is a gift to coyote hunters who’ll want to turn a profit on their pelts. Hunters – these trappers might advance - would get a jump on the taking/killing/harvesting of coyotes before a likely early November trapping season date arrives.

Perhaps, though that possibility is far less odious than demanding an additional state-mandated license on a hunter who simply took advantage of an opportunity to shoot a coyote.

Like I said: Compromise is all about making concessions. And this arrangement seems to meet that criteria.

Take the bargain, Wildlife Division; you’ve upset enough people as it is with a poorly launched proposal.

- Jeffrey L. Frischkorn
JFrischk@Ameritech.net
JFrischk4@gmail.com

Youth expected to face animal cruelty charge for alleged shooting of hunting dogs

A 17-year-old Ashtabula County youth is facing a serious animal cruelty charge for the alleged shooting of two coyote-hunting dogs.

The alleged incident occurred January 28th on private property – purportedly on the youth’s family land. This property is located a short distance east of the Ohio Division of Wildlife’s 1,080-acre Dorset Wildlife Area in Richmond Township.

It is alleged the two dogs were running coyotes on the wildlife area and had left that unit, winding up on the private property. The dogs’ owner is said to have gone looking for his dogs when he heard shooting nearby, saw one of his two dogs return and proceeded to follow a blood trail back to the other injured canine.

The youth – whose name is being withheld since he is a juvenile - is alleged to have admitted shooting both dogs with a 20-gauge shotgun. One of the canines suffered pellet wounds to the lungs while the other canine suffered wounding of a hip.

Each hunting dog subsequently required veterinarian care at a local animal clinic, though the two canines’ current health status is unknown, said an Ashtabula County prosecutor.

News accounts say the youth alleged to investigators how he and a friend were target shooting when the two dogs appeared but in a non-threatening manner.

Responding to the incident were both the Wildlife Division officer assigned to Ashtabula County as well as the Ashtabula County Sheriffs Office.

Since the matter was not associated with a hunting-type incident but an alleged case involving private property and an alleged purposeful shooting, the Wildlife Division passed the affair over to the Sheriffs Department, said a Wildlife Division law enforcement official.

Tamara A. Wetherholt – the Ashtabula County prosecutor involved with juvenile cases - says she has reviewed the Sheriffs Department investigation.

Subsequently, Wetherholt has prepared a charge to be filed on the youth. This charge will be a single count of prohibitions concerning companion animals; a Fifth Degree felony.

Such a charge carries with it a potential minimum incarceration of six months, or a potential incarceration in a juvenile detention facility until the age of 21, as well as possibly a several-hundred dollar fine, Wetherholt said.

Also, Wetherholt said she does not anticipate filing adult charges against the youth.

Once the charge is filed and signed off by the Sheriffs Department the matter will be bound over to Ashtabula County Juvenile Court Judge Albert Camples, Wetherholt said.

“It’s not something that we see every day, and I don’t understand why it was done,” Wetherholt said. “It’s sort of crazy, actually.”

- By Jeffrey L. Frischkorn
JFrischk@Ameritech.net
JFrischk4@gmail.com

Ohio's deer hunters kill 7 percent more deer, but buy 8 percent fewer deer tags

Deer hunters in Ohio scored a respectable seven percent increase in the number of animals they killed during the just-completed 2019-2020 season when stacked up against the respective 2018-2019 season.

In all, a preliminary 184,465 deer were taken. This compares to the 172,670 deer killed during the previous season.

For further comparison, during the combined 2017-2018 deer hunting year, hunters shot 186,247 animals. Meanwhile, the 2016-2017 combined tally was 182,169 deer, and the 2015-2016 season produced a deer kill of 188,335 animals.

Still, the 2019-2020 combined count is being heralded as a success by Ohio Division of Wildlife officials. Especially since only 11 of Ohio’s 88 counties encountered declines in the number of deer killed in each of them.

Also, for the fifth or sixth conservative year, more deer total were shot by hunters using archery tackle than by firearms hunters during the combined seven-day general firearms season and the two-day, so-called, bonus season: 88,860 animals for the former and 77,187 deer for the latter.

However, adding the results of the youth-only firearms season and the muzzle-loading season and all firearms still beat all archery tackle in total number of deer killed.

“Like I said at the beginning of the season, you’d have to work NOT to shoot a year this year,” said Mike Tonkovich, the Wildlife Division Division’s deer management administrator.

“And I think contributing to it was some of the best deer-hunting weather the state has seen in at least a decade,” Tonkovich said, continuing.

As a result, Tonkovich says also, he anticipates “an uptick” in reported deer hunter satisfaction in various participant surveys; some of which are still on-going.

These surveys include one offered to volunteer archery hunters, one that randomly sought out deer hunters, an on-line “open” survey available to anyone, and an intensive survey conducted by The Ohio State University.

“These surveys are of great importance in helping us set deer-hunting regulations,” Tonkovich said also.

Even so, wrinkles in the whole fabric of the state’s deer hunting landscape do appear. And these folds may show themselves once the agency stitches together its 2020-2021 deer-hunting season proposals. Such proposals are slated for presentation to the eight-member Ohio Wildlife Council on February 19^th, Tonkovich says.

Among the creases is that while hunter success rose this past year a decline of roughly eight percent was encountered in the number of deer licenses sold. Such drops translates into fewer dollars for the agency.

“But I am still expecting an increase in hunter satisfaction for the forth year in a row,” Tonkovich said, countering the negatives demonstrated by a decline in deer tag sales.

Other trouble spots are there for the looking, Tonkovich willing admits: places where the deer herd simply has not sustained itself or is on a decline for whatever reason.

Which is why the agency’s staff of biologists and law enforcement personnel will go over the deer kill results carefully, looking for those threads that may continue to unravel, Tonkovich said.

In such incidents “it may time to make a few adjustments” to deer-hunting regulations, particularly in regards to bag limits, Tonkovich says.

“It would be done selectively, not wholesale, with perhaps some adjustments in some counties to address the deer populations in them,” Tonkovich said.

Compounding matters is that the agency does not have a county-by-county way of determining hunter satisfaction in each of those political subdivisions, though the various surveys will help provide some clues, Tonkovich says.

Regarding a potential switch from the present county-oriented deer management approach to adopting a deer zone management approach, Tonkovich declined to comment on any plans nor speculation.

Here is the preliminary 2019-2020 county-by-county Ohio deer hunting kill total with their respective 2018-2019 figures in parentheses:

Adams: 2,793 (2,965); Allen: 1,118 (878); Ashland: 3,378 (2,962); Ashtabula: 4,949 (4,895); Athens: 3,360 (3,455); Auglaize: 960 (826); Belmont: 2,936 (2,629); Brown: 2,315 (2,278); Butler: 1,454 (1,273); Carroll: 3,843 (3,476); Champaign: 1,266 (1,115); Clark: 761 (748); Clermont: 2,412 (2,308); Clinton: 772 (703); Columbiana: 3,180 (2,799); Coshocton: 6,715 (6,063); Crawford: 1,256 (1,123); Cuyahoga: 903 (930); Darke: 809 (687); Defiance: 1,763 (1,588); Delaware: 1,519 (1,408); Erie: 1,058 (1,021); Fairfield: 1,857 (1,799); Fayette: 340 (290); Franklin: 735 (736); Fulton: 795 (707); Gallia: 2,191 (2,499); Geauga: 1,922 (1,858); Greene: 842 (809); Guernsey: 4,524 (4,307); Hamilton: 1,550 (1,549); Hancock: 1,387 (1,145); Hardin: 1,459 (1,163); Harrison: 3,594 (3,214); Henry: 783 (675); Highland: 2,565 (2,283); Hocking: 3,163 (2,803); Holmes: 4,507 (3,934); Huron: 2,291 (2,104); Jackson: 2,821 (2,855); Jefferson: 2,077 (1,684); Knox: 4,746 (4,271); Lake: 849 (799); Lawrence: 1,552 (1,806); Licking: 4,878 (4,587); Logan: 2,163 (1,949); Lorain: 2,134 (2,080); Lucas: 778 (721); Madison: 555 (484); Mahoning: 1,884 (1,908); Marion: 926 (788); Medina: 2,141 (2,084); Meigs: 2,910 (3,083); Mercer: 814 (674); Miami: 879 (735); Monroe: 2,472 (2,282); Montgomery: 770 (701); Morgan: 2,920 (2,940); Morrow: 1,596 (1,487); Muskingum: 4,929 (4,663); Noble: 2,914 (2,909); Ottawa: 517 (476); Paulding: 1,114 (969); Perry: 2,570 (2,447); Pickaway: 800 (727); Pike: 1,901 (1,877); Portage: 2,503 (2,295); Preble: 1,036 (979); Putnam: 849 (699); Richland: 3,469 (3,263); Ross: 2,974 (2,758); Sandusky: 880 (832); Scioto: 2,030 (2,162); Seneca: 2,054 (1,776); Shelby: 1,100 (901); Stark: 2,848 (2,788); Summit: 1,498 (1,469); Trumbull: 3,668 (3,462); Tuscarawas: 5,781 (5,245); Union: 960 (923); Van Wert: 553 (495); Vinton: 2,439 (2,392); Warren: 1,213 (1,130); Washington: 3,292 (3,110); Wayne: 2,411 (2,082); Williams: 1,660 (1,558); Wood: 1,050 (909); Wyandot: 1,562 (1,451). 2020 total: 184,465. 2019 total: (172,670)

- By Jeffrey L. Frischkorn

JFrischk@Ameritech.net

JFrischk4@gmail.com