Starting today, more than 600,000 Michigan hunters are expected to take to the woods for the state’s annual firearm deer season.
These are not the best of times for Michigan’s deer hunting industry. There’s been a sharp decline in the number of deer hunters. There’s also concern about problems with the herd, from Chronic Wasting Disease to PFAS contamination in some areas.
“We certainly have some challenges in the natural resources world,” says Dan Eichinger, the executive director of the Michigan United Conservation Clubs. “But there’s no way I would characterize this as a bad time to be a deer hunter in the state of Michigan.”
Eichinger says doing a better job of ‘balancing’ the state’s herd will help reduce health issues among the deer and help sustain the economies of rural communities that rely on the hunting business.
