Big Game Hunting Permits Increased Slightly

The Idaho Fish and Game Commission has approved a slight increase in the number of permits for trophy big game animals that will be available for the 1997 hunting season.

Accepting Department of Fish and Game staff recommendations, the commission added 37 controlled hunt permits for a total of 749 for antlered moose, and 17 permits for antlerless moose, raising the total to 98.

Two new hunts - antlered in unit 26 and antlerless in unit 75 - were added in recognition of the fact that Idaho’s moose population has grown steadily in recent years.

Hunting opportunity also will be expanded and the number of antlerless permits increased in some areas where crop depredation is expected.

Fish and Game commissioners agreed to increase the number of mountain goat permits for 1997 from 59 to 68 statewide, even though hunts in units 1 and 12 were eliminated because of declining numbers. A two-permit hunt was added in unit 27 and 13 permits were added in unit 67-1.

The number of California bighorn sheep permits in southern Idaho hunting areas also was hiked from 39 to 45. But disease outbreaks that killed dozens of sheep prompted Fish and Game to cut the number of Rocky Mountain bighorn hunting permits from 73 to 60 statewide.

Hunters are allowed to take only one animal of any trophy species in Idaho in a lifetime, a longstanding policy that the seven-member Fish and Game Commission reaffirmed.

A proposal from some sportsmen to make at least one exception to the rule was panned at public meetings conducted around the state.