MARQUETTE, Mich. (WZMQ) – Fire arm deer season opened on Friday and the DNR is keeping track of the deer harvesting.
“Now that we’ve gone to a mandatory registration most of what we’ve done today is just help people navigate that system so we can register your deer for you,” said Michigan DNR Wildlife Biologist Brian Roell.
According to the DNR service center in Marquette today was fairly slow for opening day with only just over 300 deer registered in Marquette County so far.
“I don’t expect it to be a super great opener just because of the weather conditions,” said Roell. “But as the season progresses I’m sure we’ll get some weather changes and those deer will start moving a little bit more, but a lot of folks are just happy to be out.”
Roell also said the low numbers aren’t that strange, as not everyone registers right away, and not everyone registers in person.
“If you have a smartphone or a computer you can do that at home or when you have cell coverage,” said Roell. “You could also call us if you weren’t able to come in, but you do have 72 hours to do that.
The DNR also can help hunters see the weight and age of any deer they register in person.
“We have a courtesy here if you’re interested we can weigh your deer,” said Roell. “It’s nothing that we record or anything like that but some folks like to know how old their deer is, how much does it weigh, and those kinds of things.”
The mandatory registration also helps the DNR keep an eye out for Chronic Waste Disease, which, while the DNR says is always a concern, they’re not too worried about this year.
“We’ve only had one case identified and that was years ago in Dickenson county,” said Roell. “But we still are doing surveillance for it so we have some different counties that we’re primarily looking for. Marquette happens to not be one of the counties.”
Click here for more information about harvest reporting, or to register a deer.
