SIOUX FALLS — The South Dakota Game, Fish and Park Commission held its monthly meeting on July 11-12 at Good Earth State Park near Sioux Falls.
Wildlife proposals
Bobcat …
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SIOUX FALLS — The South Dakota Game, Fish and Park Commission held its monthly meeting on July 11-12 at Good Earth State Park near Sioux Falls.
The commission proposed the 2024-25 and 2025-26 bobcat hunting and trapping seasons with the following dates:
2025
2026
The proposal also included a change restricting Black Hills bobcat hunters or trappers to be limited to one bobcat per hunter or trapper.
The commission proposed a change to update scientific names for certain species of crayfish to reflect updates in taxonomic classification.
The board proposed to modify the existing harvest regulation on Belle Fourche Reservoir. Currently, four walleye may be taken daily, but only those less than 15 inches in length or 18 inches or greater in length, and of the walleye taken daily, no more than one may be 18 inches or greater in length. The proposal would allow a two fish daily limit with a 15-inch minimum on Belle Fourche Reservoir.
The commission proposed to modify annual reporting requirements for private hatcheries by requiring an annual summary to be submitted rather than individual records.
The board proposed to allow snagging of all salmon species during the months of October and November on Lake Oahe.
Commissioners continued discussions on the 2025 and 2026 spring turkey hunting seasons with the following dates:
2025
2026
* Depending on the geographic area being hunted, the mentored and archery spring seasons align with the prairie and Black Hills seasons, respectively.
The commission proposal will expand the archery statewide turkey hunting unit to include the portion of Lake County south of state Highway 34.
The commission proposed to change the name of the unit including Aurora and Douglas counties to PST-10A from PST-18A.
The commission proposed to limit the number of nonresident licenses to 2,225 one-tag male turkey licenses in the Black Hills hunting unit.
Proposed license numbers for the 2025 and 2026 spring firearms turkey hunting season prairie units would be 7,605 resident and 318 nonresident licenses; with the Black Hills season having unlimited resident single “male turkey” licenses and a limited number of nonresident single “male turkey” licenses, and Custer State Park having 100 resident only “male turkey” licenses.
Good Earth State Park would have five archery “male turkey” access permits and Adams Homestead and Nature Preserve would have 30 archery and 20 mentored youth “male turkey” access permits under this proposal.
Senate Bill 55 was introduced by the department during the 2024 legislative session and was passed and signed by the governor. The new law amended SDCL 41-17-13 to eliminate the option to purchase a discounted second annual park entrance license through the stub/coupon method and eliminated the ability to buy multiple discounted annuals through common vehicle registration.
The commission eliminated the stub/coupon method of discounted park entrance licenses and multiple discounted annual process using vehicle registrations.
This will now provide the availability of a double license option (one full price license and one-half price license when purchased together). There are no limits on how many double licenses may be purchased.
Commissioners finalized the proposal to reduce the air gun muzzle velocity minimum from 1,000 feet per second to 600 feet per second to hunt cottontail rabbit, red squirrel, fox squirrel, grey squirrel, and any species defined as a predator/varmint. Varmints include coyote, gray fox, red fox, skunk, gopher, ground squirrel, chipmunk, jackrabbit, marmot, opossum, porcupine, crow and prairie dog.
The board finalized the 2024 and 2025 firearms antelope hunting seasons for the following dates:
Applicants for a special antelope license will now be able to apply for an antelope license in the second lottery drawing instead of the third drawing as previously allowed.
The commission made a minor unit boundary adjustment for Butte County and specified in rule the Stanley and Jones County prairie units do not include the Fort Pierre National Grasslands.
Landowner own land licenses will now be a one buck antelope license. Previously, landowner own land licenses had allowed one any antelope license or one two-tag any antelope and any doe-fawn antelope license.
Additionally, the board removed the option for a mentored child to obtain a doe/kid antelope license to increase antelope population growth across the state, thus eliminating all doe harvest with the exception of 100 special antelope “any antelope” licenses.
License numbers for the 2024 and 2025 seasons will be 2,020 resident and 99 nonresident firearms licenses.
Commissioners also finalized the 2024 and 2025 Archery Antelope Hunting season for the following dates:
2024
2025
There will no longer be five archery antelope access permits for Custer and Pennington Counties within the Black Hills Fire Protection District.
The commission created ten resident archery antelope access permits for the Fort Pierre National Grasslands.
Commission ers finalized the 2024-25 and 2025-26 fall turkey hunting seasons with the following dates of Nov. 1–Jan 31.
The commission finalization removed Douglas County from Unit PFT-17A (Charles Mix County) and changed the name of the unit including Aurora and Douglas counties to PFT-10A from PFT-18A.
The commission also included Unit PFT-58A (Stanley County) as an open unit and modified the PFT-06A (Brookings County) fall turkey hunting unit to include the portion of Brookings County west of Interstate 29.
License numbers for the 2024 and 2025 seasons will be 1,720 resident and 72 nonresident.
To hear the discussion on any of the topics on the agenda, audio from the meeting is available through South Dakota Public Broadcasting and will soon be available on the GFP website as part of the meeting archive.
To see these documents in their entirety, visit gfp.sd.gov/commission/information.
To be included in the public record and to be considered by the commission, public comments must include a full name and city of residence and be submitted by 11:59 p.m. CDT on Sept. 1.
The next regular commission meeting will be Sept. 5-6 in Rapid City.
