Hunters take full advantage of Ohio's 2022 two-day "bonus" firearms deer-hunting season - and then some

Largely good to exceptional hunting conditions and an abundant supply of white-tails led to a well-above typical kill during Ohio’s recently concluded two-day - so-called “bonus” - firearms deer-hunting season.

This season ran December 17th and 18th and saw a preliminary total deer kill of 15,163 animals. That figure is 5,771 more deer than were shot during the 2021 two-day bonus gun season in which 9,392 animals were killed. And the 2022 figure is also 2,219 more deer than is the three-year average of 12,944 animals.

In fact, so successful were this year’s two-day bonus season hunters, that only five of Ohio 88 counties - Butler, Hamilton, Lucas, Shelby, and Warren - saw declines this time around verses their respective 2021 bonus gun season results.

And a number of counties experienced a doubling or near doubling of their respective 2022 bonus gun season results over their respective 2021 bonus gun season figures. Among them were Ashtabula, Columbiana, Jefferson, Morrow, and Pickaway counties.

“Conditions for deer hunters were pretty favorable over the weekend, with low- to mid-30 temperatures across much of the state, and with a little bit of the white stuff blowing around,” said Clint McCoy the Ohio Division of Wildlife’s lead deer management biologist.

McCoy said the take for the two-day “bonus” season was 17 percent above the three-year average, “but pretty comparable to the two-day seasons of 2019 (14,009 deer) and 2020 (15,203 deer),” McCoy said.

Likewise, McCoy said, the to-date all-seasons’ total up through the two-day weekend now sits at 182,832 animals. Meanwhile, the three-year average total through the same time period is 169,406 deer, “so we’re ahead by about 8 percent,” McCoy said.

“When looking at historical data, we’ve harvested about 88 percent of the season total by the end of the two-day gun season. If that trend holds true this year, we’re looking at a season total that should eclipse the 200,000 mark and be somewhere in the neighborhood of 205,000 to 210,000 deer,” McCoy says.

If so, this would make the 11th time in Ohio deer-hunting history that more than 200,000 animals were shot in a single season. The last time that more than 200,000 animals were taken in a season was during the 2012-2013 season with 218,910 animals shot. The largest number of deer taken in Ohio was during the 2009-2010 season with 216,260 animals.

Here are the county-by-county totals for Ohio’s two-day, commonly called “bonus” firearms deer hunting seasons. The first set of figures are the preliminary 2022 numbers, the second set of numbers was the 2021 preliminary two-day season totals, and the third set of numbers is the current three-year average for the two-day firearms deer-hunting season.

Adams: 253/164/186; Allen: 100/52/80; Ashland: 368/210/280; Ashtabula: 473/232/448; Athens: 265/159/20); Auglaize: 94/55/68; Belmont: 282/153/224; Brown: 182/130/169; Butler: 89/90/102; Carroll: 404/220/340; Champaign: 122/79/100; Clark: 60/36/44; Clermont: 181/112/153; Clinton: 55/38/50; Columbiana: 345/161/284; Coshocton: 517/307/423; Crawford: 115/71/88; Cuyahoga: 15/6/14; Darke: 59/47/60; Defiance: 145/101/147; Delaware: 102/69/82; Erie: 59/47/also 59; Fairfield: 159/110/146; Fayette: 22/12/18; Franklin: 53/29/37; Fulton: 57/41/49; Gallia: 187/132/154; Geauga: 154/74/135; Greene: 51/46/64; Guernsey: 382/236/327; Hamilton: 38/41/47; Hancock: 119/76/104; Hardin: 106/67/108; Harrison: 283/156/265; Henry: 60/47/52; Highland: 229/147/188; Hocking: 233/137/173; Holmes: 331/208/312; Huron: 207/113/187; Jackson: 215/150/170; Jefferson: 227/115/171; Knox: 396/229/352; Lake: 40/25/45; Lawrence: 102/89/108; Licking: 403/256/354; Logan: 184/132/156; Lorain: 187/111/156; Lucas: 16/21/22; Madison: 49/38/51; Mahoning: 173/106/142; Marion: 84/55/79; Medina: 221/165/166; Meigs: 230/184/227; Mercer: 77/49/60; Miami: 48/47/56; Monroe: 177/141/182; Montgomery: 52/20/39; Morgan: 226/157/180; Morrow: 152/88/117; Muskingum: 431/219/298; Noble: 230/160/198; Ottawa: 47/25/39; Paulding: 106/72/90; Perry: 227/112/163; Pickaway: 92/44/48; Pike: 145/67/94; Portage: 175/108/156; Preble: 85/67/80; Putnam: 55/32/47; Richland: 310/172/256; Ross: 217/150/189; Sandusky: 61/45/56; Scioto: 152/126/148; Seneca: 161/111/167; Shelby: 77/80/86; Stark: 272/134/205; Summit: 66 /29/57; Trumbull: 342/161/296; Tuscarawas: 513/287/439; Union: 63/58/68; Van Wert: 56/28/34; Vinton: 149/120/145; Warren: 68/69/73; Washington: 274/162/224; Wayne: 211/133/168; Williams: 159/96/131; Wood: 61/55/69; Wyandot: 143/98/112. 2022 Total: 15,163/ 2021 Total: 9,392/ 3-Year Average Total: 12,944.

By Jeffrey L. Frischkorn

JFrischk@Ameritech.net

JFrischk4@gmail.com

One for the books - Ohio's 2022 firearms deer-hunting season a success, with a few important exceptions

 Hunters participating in Ohio’s recently concluded 2022 week-long firearms deer-hunting season managed to exceed the total number of deer taken when compared to the same season in 2021.

This seven-day firearms deer-hunting season ran November 28th through December 4th. A two-day firearms (often called a”bonus”) deer-hunting season is set for December 17th and 18th.

What’s more, the preliminary 2022 firearms deer-hunting season total of 71,932 animals exceeded the three-year average by five percent. And that gain was hardly unexpected or unwelcome by the Ohio Division of Wildlife biologists tasked with managing the state’s thriving herd of white-tailed deer.

“Overall, we had a solid season deer gun season and harvest fell in line with pretty much what we would have expected,” said Clint McCoy, the Wildlife Division official who is pegged as the agency’s deer management primary care biologist.

Looking at the individual counties, McCoy said those hit hardest with epizootic hemorrhagic disease (EHD) were among the season’s casualties.

“EHD is continuing to show up with lower harvests compared to their respective three-year averages.  For the week of gun season: Butler County saw a 23- percent decline, Hamilton County saw a 21-percent decline, and Warren Couny saw an 11-percent decline, and each of them are southwest Ohio,” McCoy said.

Meanwhile, Vinton County - anchored in southeast Ohio - experienced a 12-percent drop, McCoy said also. 

 

Also, the three counties in the Wildlife Division’s so-named chronic wasting disease  “Disease Surveillance Area” likewise came in with lower gun season harvests. This drop, “most likely due to the fact that many hunters had already filled some tags during the early, three-day gun season that was held in those counties in early October,” McCoy said.

The fall-off was a decline of 26- percent in Marion County, a 16 percent decline in Hardin County, and an 8 percent decline in Wyandot County.

“On the other end of the spectrum, three northwest Ohio farmland counties saw the most significant bumps in the gun season harvest,” McCoy said.

Among them were Auglaize County - up 30 percent, Putnam County - also up 30 percent, and Henry County - up 29 percent.

Similarly said McCoy, the three counties that increased from 1-deer to 2-deer this year “were also up significantly.”

These counties were Clinton - up 19 percent, Pickaway - up 22 percent, and Fayette - up 28 percent.

Southern Ohio had a few big gainers, as well, said McCoy with Jackson County

experiencing a 17 percent increase, Gallia County seeing a 23 percent increase,  and Scioto noting a remarkable 24 percent increase.

The situation was a bit different in Northeast Ohio’s fabled Snow Belt region. Opening day saw large swaths of lake-effect cold drizzle that would turn to rain and back again. And Saturday saw near gale-force winds across a good portion of this region.

Not surprisingly therefore, the counties of Lorain, Cuyahoga, Lake, Ashtabula, Geauga and Trumbull all experienced slippage in their respective 2022 deer kills verses their 2021 deer kills. Some of these Northeast Ohio counties more so than others within the Snow Belt group.

Stll, all told, McCoy said one-half of Ohio’s 88 counties “recorded a gun week harvest increase at least 5 percent above their respective three-year averages.”

“And 33 counties ended up pretty similar to recent seasons, being up or down less than 5 percent, while 11 counties had a gun season harvest that was at least 5 percent lower than their respective averages,” McCoy said.

 

Here are the county-by-county preliminary firearms deer-hunting totals, first phase for 2022/followed by the preliminary 2021 totals/and lastly the preliminary Three-Year average:

Adams: 1,043/1042/1,002; Allen: 442/352/372; Ashland: 1,440/1,444/1,418; Ashtabula: 1,987/2,039/2,036; Athens: 1,250/1,327/1,282; Auglaize: 503/431/386; Belmont: 1,204/1,154/1,197; Brown: 922/887/896; Butler: 270/352/also 352; Carroll: 1,902/1,767/1,635; Champaign: 500/469/438; Clark: 214/209/203; Clermont: 652/609/658; Clinton: 270/208/227; Columbiana: 1,446/1,362/1,293; Coshocton: 2,457/2,403/2,336; Crawford: 669/646/618; Cuyahoga: 45/49/48; Darke: 365/303/304; Defiance: 923/802/851; Delaware: 428/441/413; Erie: 271/327/296; Fairfield: 737/765/729; Fayette: 164/117/128; Franklin: 162/159/153; Fulton: 387/407/370; Gallia: 1,280/1,113/1,037; Geauga: 603/700/608; Greene: 265/246/247; Guernsey: 1,848/1,968/1,864; Hamilton: 119/140/151; Hancock: 658/606/587; Hardin: 520/640/620; Harrison: 1,365/1,318/1,380; Henry: 532/438/411; Highland: 1,085/1,118/1,038; Hocking: 1,151/1,102/1,126; Holmes: 1,521/1,645/1,587; Huron: 1,158/1,166/1,109; Jackson: 1,135/986/970; Jefferson: 930/866/843; Knox: 1,909/2,023/1,934; Lake: 163/164/170; Lawrence: 751/677/667; Licking: 1,729/1,712/1,729; Logan: 758/780/766; Lorain: 661/783/698; Lucas: 130/103/124; Madison: 191/234/201; Mahoning: 548/614/ 571; Marion: 312/446/419; Medina: 724/682/675; Meigs: 1,270/1,261/1,156; Mercer: 431/422/363; Miami: 257/256/242; Monroe: 1,218/1,103/1,093; Montgomery: 183/206/181; Morgan: 1,387/1,298/1,285; Morrow: 706/633/648; Muskingum: 2,326/2,107/2,056; Noble: 1,331/1,249/1,234; Ottawa: 177/173/162; Paulding: 544/598/543; Perry: 1,183/1,112/1,075; Pickaway: 321/259/263; Pike: 731/623/644; Portage: 683/719/661; Preble: 315/334/317; Putnam: 461/370/354; Richland: 1,300/1,346/1,338; Ross: 1,076/1,056/1,063; Sandusky: 333/305/307; Scioto: 864/683/696; Seneca: 945/927/864; Shelby: 483/400/397; Stark: 1,030/929/899; Summit: 187/206/193; Trumbull: 1,104/1,241/1,206; Tuscarawas: 2,321/2,204/2,176; Union: 374/380/364; Van Wert: 283/268/260; Vinton: 786/930/892; Warren: 289/317/324; Washington: 1,628/1,483/1,436; Wayne: 858/893/863; Williams: 770/719/691; Wood: 359/340/362; Wyandot: 719/722/781. Preliminary 2022 Total: 71,932/ Preliminary 2021 total: 70,413/ Preliminary Three-Year Average Total: 68,534.

- By Jeffrey L. Frischkorn

JFrischk@ameritech.net

JFrischk4@gmail.com

State's vaunted Electronic Game Check system suffers hours-long crash on Ohio's deer gun season opener

 

“Anything that can go wrong will go wrong, and at the worst possible moment.” “Murphy’s Law,” first written usage attributed the 19^th Century mathematician, Augustus De Morgan.

An unknown number of hunters on the November 28th opening day of Ohio’s firearms deer-hunting season were thwarted by a technical glitch that prevented them from accessing the state’s much vaunted electronic “Game Check” system.

For several hours on the November 28th the system’s vendor – selected through competitive bidding process by the Ohio Division of Wildlife – was unable to process the checking in of deer. This, on the most important and busiest day of Ohio’s various and long combined deer-hunting season.

“Harvest figures are based on date and time of check -automatically generated by our licensing/game check system - rather than the hunter provided date/time of kill. Our game check system went down on Monday (November 28th) evening, obviously an unfortunate time for it to misbehave!,” said Clint McCoy, the Wildlife Division’s chief deer management biologist.

McCoy was in Wyondot County CWD deer-check system on Monday when the system crashed.

“Thankfully, it was restored within a few hours, but there were certainly some hunters that tried to check a deer on Monday evening that ended up checking it on Tuesday,” McCoy said.

Consequently, McCoy said “for this reason, our opening day figure is likely biased a bit low and our Tuesday harvest likely inflated a bit.”

Taking both days together it looks like 32,870 deer were reported in the first two days of the gun season, which is “a bit shy of last year’s 34,748 deer for the two days, but about 18 percent more deer than the three-year average of 27,948 deer,” McCoy said.

“All told so far we’re at 124,368 deer reported through Tuesday of gun season, which is pretty much on pace with last year’s harvest which was sitting at 122,262 through the same time period,” McCoy said.

Thus, overall, “opening day provided pretty solid hunting weather with temperatures in the 40s and little to no precipitation across most of the state,” McCoy said.

Here are the opening day firearms deer-hunting season kills. They are reported as Opening Day 2022/Opening Day 2021/Opening Day, three-year average:

Adams: 226/288/220; Allen: 88/92/75; Ashland: 368/504/357; Ashtabula: 548/725/538; Athens: 318/420/305; Auglaize: 135/135/93; Belmont: 273/335/267; Brown: 210/249/203); Butler: 51/99/75; Carroll: 464/607/421; Champaign: 92/127/99; Clark: 42/53/33; Clermont: 134/162/132; Clinton: 56/57/50; Columbiana: 397/448/330; Coshocton: 591/850/624; Crawford: 175/191/137; Cuyahoga: 7/8/(also 8); Darke: 69/86/67; Defiance: 283/297/241; Delaware: 79/139/104; Erie: 73/91/57; Fairfield: 196/240/164; Fayette: 33/36/26; Franklin: 35/38/32; Fulton: 105/150/108; Gallia: 271/306/225; Geauga: 118/205/128; Greene: 60/70/46; Guernsey: 434/642/448; Hamilton: 24/30/20; Hancock: 165/164/104; Hardin: 112/166/138; Harrison: 310/429/357; Henry: 160/140/113; Highland: 244/309/237; Hocking: 305/308/265; Holmes: 369/650/451; Huron: 347/375/268; Jackson: 273/284/209; Jefferson: 239/232/190; Knox: 474/679/519; Lake: 45/43/29; Lawrence: 153/216/144; Licking: 430/572/427; Logan: 177/241/(also 177); Lorain: 133/193/130; Lucas: 28/27/25; Madison: 36/67/41; Mahoning: 138/200/139; Marion: 78/158/103; Medina: 138/181/119; Meigs: 289/370/259; Mercer: 118/(also 118)/85; Miami: 49/53/38; Monroe: 281/276/230; Montgomery: 43/56/38; Morgan: 330/382/292; Morrow: 162/217/156; Muskingum: 584/677/505; Noble: 294/387/283; Ottawa: 36/56/32; Paulding: 131/203/160; Perry: 299/369/258; Pickaway: 68/(also 68)/58; Pike: 123/173/133; Portage: 148/189/131; Preble: 63/83/55; Putnam: 134/117/85; Richland: 305/414/323; Ross: 205/264/209; Sandusky: 77/72/52; Scioto: 173/159/117; Seneca: 257/310/206; Shelby: 94/112/81; Stark: 246/269/185; Summit: 33/36/22; Trumbull: 301/382/313; Tuscarawas: 584/729/546; Union: 90/119/81; Van Wert: 63/81/59; Vinton: 164/262/189; Warren: 71/81/60; Washington: 373/436/324; Wayne: 179/251/180; Williams: 244/318/231; Wood: 88/89/70; Wyandot: 185/262/193.
2022 Total: 17,193/2021 Total: 21,754/3-Year Average Total:16,057.

By Jeffrey L. Frischkorn

JFrischk@Ameritech.net

JFrischk4@gmail.com

Shortened season didn't stop Ohio's fall wild turkey hunters from hitting the bull's-eye

 

In spite of dealing with a regulatory shortened season, fall wild turkey hunters in Ohio still did better than just okay; they field dressed the final kill results.

Ohio’s fall wild turkey season was open from October 8th to November 13th in 70 of Ohio’s 88 counties. This season was two weeks shorter than has occurred in recent years.

The total reported wild turkey kill for this newly created abbreviated season was 1,003 birds. That figure represents a 44-percent increase from Ohio’s 2021 season – 695 birds – and was within one percent of the 5-year average of 999 birds (the years 2017 through 2021).

“If we exclude the last two weeks of the previous three fall seasons in Ohio (or the years 2019 through 2021), the average total harvest would be 737 birds per fall season,” said Mark Wiley, the Ohio Division of Wildlife’s chief wild turkey management biologist.

Wiley said, too, that increased permit success rates suggest fall hunters encountered better turkey numbers than in recent years.

“Above average poult indices in 2021 and 2022 also suggest turkey numbers likely improved. We typically see increased fall turkey harvest in years with high poult indices, though 2021 was a rare exception to this pattern,” Wiley said.

Not to be lost, either, noted Wiley, is that unofficially, the Wildlife Division issued 7,100 fall turkey permits, which represented a 5-percent decrease from 2021 when the agency issued 7,47 fall wild turkey-hunting permits.

And from all the 2022 fall permits, 50 percent, 9 percent, and 7 percent were issued to residents, nonresidents, and youth hunters, respectively. Reduced cost or free permits accounted for 33 percent, Wiley said as well.

“The permit success rate (percentage of permits resulting in harvest) was 7.9 percent across all permit types. This is above the 5-year average (again, 2017-2021) of 6.1 percent,” Wiley said.

In terms of where 2022 fall birds were taken, Wiley said that 95 percent reportedly came from private land and the remaining 5 percent came from public lands.

Interestingly, fully 441 turkeys - or 44 percent - were taken by landowners.

Broken down further, the total fall wild turkey kill included 50 percent male turkeys, followed by 48 percent female turkeys, and 2 percent of unknown sex.

Too, says, Wiley, the percentage of turkeys taken by shotgun was down, while the percentage taken by archery tackle was up. Way up, in fact.

Statistics show that during Ohio’s 2021 fall wild turkey-hunting season, 52.2 percent of the birds killed were taken with shotguns. Meanwhile, the just concluded season saw that number tumble to 45.3 percent.

Vertical archery tackle success remained pretty close year-to-year 2021 verses 2022: 16.4 percent and 16.7 percent, respectively.

However, the percentage of birds taken by crossbow soared. For Ohio’s 2021 fall season, 31.4 percent of the birds shot were taken with crossbow archery tackle, a figure that rocketed to 37.9 percent for this past fall season Wiley said.

Here are the preliminary county-by-county harvest figures for Ohio’s 2022 fall wild turkey-hunting season:

County	Female		Male		Unk.	Total		County	Female		Male		Unk.	Total
	Adult	Juv.	Adult	Juv.					Adult	Juv.	Adult	Juv.
Adams	2	3	5	1	1	12		Knox	6	0	9	1	0	16
Allen	3	0	2	0	0	5		Lake	2	0	6	1	0	9
Ashland	5	1	8	2	0	16		Lawrence	5	1	5	0	0	11
Ashtabula	15	3	12	4	0	34		Licking	13	0	9	1	0	23
Athens	6	0	8	1	2	17		Logan	3	0	6	1	0	10
Belmont	13	0	8	0	0	21		Lorain	4	0	4	0	0	8
Brown	4	0	7	1	0	12		Lucas	9	1	4	0	0	14
Butler	4	0	11	0	0	15		Mahoning	7	0	3	1	0	11
Carroll	6	3	8	1	0	18		Medina	2	0	2	0	0	4
Champaign	1	0	3	0	1	5		Meigs	7	3	13	2	0	25
Clermont	5	0	8	2	0	15		Monroe	13	2	14	0	1	30
Columbiana	5	2	17	3	0	27		Morgan	8	2	3	3	0	16
Coshocton	15	5	16	1	1	38		Morrow	1	2	3	0	0	6
Crawford	1	0	1	1	0	3		Muskingum	12	1	13	0	0	26
Cuyahoga	0	0	5	0	0	5		Noble	6	1	5	1	0	13
Defiance	2	0	8	0	0	10		Paulding	2	1	4	0	0	7
Delaware	2	0	7	3	0	12		Perry	8	1	11	2	0	22
Erie	1	0	2	1	0	4		Pike	5	1	10	1	0	17
Fairfield	4	0	2	0	1	7		Portage	6	0	6	2	0	14
Franklin	1	0	0	0	0	1		Preble	5	0	4	0	1	10
Fulton	1	1	0	0	0	2		Putnam	2	0	1	0	0	3
Gallia	8	1	8	2	0	19		Richland	8	3	6	0	0	17
Geauga	14	1	6	2	0	23		Ross	4	0	8	3	0	15
Guernsey	16	1	6	3	0	26		Scioto	6	0	4	1	0	11
Hamilton	3	1	9	1	0	14		Seneca	1	3	1	1	0	6
Hancock	2	0	0	0	1	3		Stark	11	1	6	0	1	19
Hardin	0	3	2	0	0	5		Summit	5	1	0	0	0	6
Harrison	8	3	15	1	0	27		Trumbull	7	6	8	1	2	24
Henry	2	0	2	0	0	4		Tuscarawas	13	4	15	2	0	34
Highland	13	4	9	2	1	29		Vinton	8	1	9	1	0	19
Hocking	10	1	5	1	0	17		Warren	2	0	5	0	0	7
Holmes	3	4	11	1	0	19		Washington	13	3	8	3	1	28
Huron	0	0	0	1	0	1		Wayne	3	1	2	2	1	9
Jackson	6	2	5	0	0	13		Williams	2	1	4	1	0	8
Jefferson	12	2	8	0	1	23		Wyandot	1	0	1	1	0	3
								Grand Total	403	81	436	67	16	1,003

By Jeffrey L. Frischkorn

JFrischk@Ameritech.net

JFrischk4@gmail.com