S-R Hunting Outlook 2015: Idaho hunters have positive outlook despite wildfires

Idaho is well into its 2015 hunting seasons, with archery deer opening on Aug. 30 and archery elk on Sept. 6. Hunters after black bears and grouse have been poking around the mountains for weeks.

But it’s been a slow start.

Closures and restrictions caused by wildfires kept early-season hunters out of many traditional hot spots, including much of the Coeur d’Alene and St. Joe river areas.

Restrictions are easing and national forest closures are steadily reopening to public access. Nearly 1 million acres of private timberlands in the Inland Northwest also have reopened at least to foot-entry in the past week, including those controlled by Potlatch and Inland Empire Paper Company. Stimson Lumber officials this week are evaluating how long to continue the closure of their lands.

Having millions of acres from the Clearwater region north through the Panhandle closed could have caused major issues with overcrowding if the restrictions were to be in place on Oct. 10, when large numbers of North Idaho big-game modern firearms hunters would be locked out of their favorite areas.

But the lower numbers of bowhunters who did face those sweeping closures generally took the lack of access in stride, said Wayne Wakkinen, Idaho Fish and Game’s regional wildlife manager in Coeur d’Alene.

They were patient or they melted into other areas, he said.

“Everybody is aware that it’s been a horrible fire year,” he said. “But the weather is cooling. We’re getting some rain here and there and fires and fire-fighting activity is starting to settle down.

“Hunters still need to be more flexible than they have in the past. Recognize this is an exceptional year. If you’ve been displaced by a fire or a closure that’s still in place, consider that maybe finding a new hunting spot isn’t a bad thing.”

Hunters should find much to celebrate, he said.

“Surveys show that we’ve had good survival of elk calves and deer for two consecutive winters,” he said. “Hunters should see more young bulls and bucks this year, and as a side, the grouse crop is excellent.”

The fire season is not over, Wakkinen pointed out.

The 1991 Firestorm of nearly 100 fires that ravaged the Spokane region and destroyed more than 100 homes began in the middle of October, he noted.

Some North Idaho forest areas likely will be closed for the rest of the year as fire crews mop up, rehabilitate slopes and fire lines, shore up landslides and remove some of the dangerous snags along roads, Forest Service officials say.

“All of us here in the Panhandle need to put these fires in perspective,” Wakkinen said.

The people who lost their homes to fires on the Spokane Indian Reservation last month or the entire towns that are being burned to the ground in California aren’t sympathizing too much with hunters temporarily displaced form the early season in Unit 4, he said.

“We’re inconvenienced, but our fires have not been catastrophic as they have been in other areas,” he said.

“The short-term problems could turn out to be long-term gains for elk hunters. Many of the fires in the Snow Peak area and Coeur d’Alene drainage are in places Fish and Game and the Forest Service had already identified for timber management to boost elk habitat either through selective logging or prescribed burns.

“We’d rather do the burns in a controlled fashion and on smaller scale, but generally it looks as though nature is putting fire in areas that will benefit elk down the road.”