Gun Deer Season Opens Nov. 17

Wisconsin’s gun deer season opener is this Saturday and while many aspects of this year’s hunt will be consistent with last year, some changes are afoot. So far, the number of licenses sold are on par with last year. Just more than 559,000 licenses were sold as of Monday, which is up about 1 percent from the same time last year, according to state officials. Around 588,000 licenses were sold during the nine-day-long gun season last year, which was down 1.7 percent from 2016. Kevin Wallenfang, deer and elk ecologist with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, said there are no major changes for hunters this year. He said one change though is that the deer opener is a little early this year. “That typically means because the deer are rutting, going through the mating rituals in the early part of November with an early gun opener, that should help with deer activity because the deer are still in that rutting mode,” he said. Wallenfang added that the dry, cold weather, combined with a corn harvest that’s ahead of schedule, should make for a good opening weekend. Iron County is the only county in the state with a buck-only harvest.