SPECIAL DNR RULE CHANGES FOR TAGGING LAWS==ROGER'S OUTDOOR NEWS

SPECIAL DNR PRESS RELEASE EFFECT SEPT. 23, With the passage of the State Budget Act (Bill) earlier today, I want to give all of you a heads up that there are a number of changes related to Deer, Turkey and Canada Goose that will be going into effect immediately. The Department will be issuing media releases and other communications tomorrow to help inform our staff and our customers. In preparation for tomorrow’s communication, COS staff are currently making arrangements to prepare and schedule COS training sessions for next early next week to provide additional details and clarifications to you so you can help inform customers. Here is a summary of the key elements that are changing: Deer - Carcass tags for deer are no longer required to be validated or attached to a carcass upon harvest. Registration continues to be important of understanding harvest rates in order to effectively manage Wisconsin’s deer herd. Hunters continue to be required to carry as proof that they have the authorization to hunt and will be able to use their DNR issued Conservation Card, a GoWild validated WI driver’s license, a GoWild digital file or a paper tag/authorization. • GoWild will be reprogrammed to create a deer tag template that will no longer require validation or tag attachment language. The Department will honor all deer carcass tags previously issued with validation stubs, even though the hunter will no longer need to remove the stub or attach the carcass tag to the deer. • Harvest registration information will continue to be critically important. As a result, the deer carcass tag number on tags that have already been printed/sold and the “harvest authorization number” associated with licenses sold going forward for the remainder of the year, will be connected to the customer’s profile for harvest registration purposes. The unique tag number or harvest authorization number will continue be used for deer harvest registration purposes. Turkey - Carcass tags for turkey are no longer required to be validated or attached to a carcass upon harvest as well. The Department will allow the use of previously purchased turkey carcass tags to serve as the new turkey harvest authorization. Registration continues to be important of understanding harvest rates in order to effectively manage Wisconsin’s deer herd. Hunters continue to be required to carry as proof that they have the authorization to hunt and will be able to use their DNR issued Conservation Card, a GoWild validated WI driver’s license, a GoWild digital file or a paper tag/authorization. • GoWild will be reprogrammed to create a system for issuing turkey harvest authorizations. The system will manage the number of harvest authorizations issued per zone and time period. • Harvest registration information will continue to be critically important. The tag number or harvest authorization number will be connected to the customer’s profile for harvest registration purposes. The unique number that was previously issued as a tag number will be accepted as the harvest authorization number and will be used for harvest reporting purposes for the remainder of the fall season. Canada Goose – • Goose registration is no longer required. • The Wisconsin DNR wildlife management program will collect goose harvest information by incorporating survey questions on Canada goose harvest into the annual small game harvest survey tool. The small game harvest survey is an annual survey to the hunting public which provides data to estimate harvest for such species as ruffed grouse, pheasant, cottontail rabbit as well as many other species. • The current car killed deer authorization system will be expanded to include vehicle killed turkey. For those of you that are unfamiliar with this system, motorists are allowed to pick up vehicle-killed deer and now turkey from the side of the road and get an authorization to keep the carcass by either going on-line to the WDNR website at dnr.wi.gov, key word car killed deer or by calling 608.267.7691. Currently, the COS management team is working to develop additional training materials for you, developing plans for needed GoWild and GameReg updates and preparing communication plans to reach out to our agents. We will share additional details as soon as possible. In addition, our DNR partners are reviewing and updating web sites and other communication materials. There is a rollout plan that includes sharing information on Facebook as well as other sources and a press release will be going out on this tomorrow. Once the media release has gone out to all staff tomorrow, please feel free to answer any of the basic questions that you may get on this change. We will be establishing Department spokespeople for media and complex questions. Stay tuned. Certainly this is a big change for wildlife management and law enforcement from the historical carcass tagging requirements however what is critically important is that we continue to spread the word and enforce the importance of the registration process in our ability to effectively manage Wisconsin’s deer herd moving forward. Once again, the Customer and Outreach Services staff will be critical to helping communicate these changes to our customers. 2017