It’s beginning to feel a lot like Christmas if you are an avid outdoors person in the state of Minnesota. It’s 50 degrees today as I write and there are many anticipated dates I can see from here on the near horizon.
One of my favorites is the Minnesota youth deer hunt. This is a special season for youths between the ages of 10 and 17. They get their own four-day season to harvest a deer without the normal hunting pressure that exists during the regular firearms season.
This season has been around for a few years but was expanded last year to four days over the super popular MEA weekend.
It allows an adult to take a youth deer hunting without having to be licensed. The participation rate skyrocketed last year when it was expanded to four days and the harvest rate was far higher than the years prior to that.
Last year during the youth deer season, I had a youth by the name of Spencer Nickel hunt on my ground.
He was mentored by a great friend of mine, Kyle Johnson and harvested the biggest buck taken on my property and the biggest buck he had ever harvested. It was a huge win-win for everyone.
Getting permission to hunt deer on private land is getting more difficult to achieve. I urge every landowner who cares about the future of hunting to carefully screen their permission requestors and allow one or two lucky youth the opportunity they would not otherwise have.
The youth season requires that an adult be a non-hunting participant for ages 10-13. Youth ages 14 and up can hunt solo if they choose.
All kids 12 and older have to first complete their firearms safety program. There is something that allows the youth to try out hunting without this safety training using an apprentice hunter validation certificate.
It requires an adult present and can only be used for two seasons. After two seasons the youth will know if they want to continue in the sport or not. At that point they will need to take the important safety training.
Licenses for this youth deer hunt are free for 10-12 years old. The license fee is much lower than adult fees for kids 13-17. It is not too late to get organized to take a youth hunting in this special season.
All of the regular hunting rules apply, like blaze orange requirements, shooting hours, approved firearms calibers/gauges and the like.
The special season is open statewide and does not prevent the youth from party hunting in the regular season with family and friends.
There is no party hunting during this special season. Party hunting, which allows members of the same group to shoot deer for other members of the group, has been around for decades.
It cannot be used in the special youth season. Each youth must shoot his/her own deer. One of the rules that is the same during the youth hunt and the regular gun season is that all youth can shoot a deer of either sex. This in reality means every youth gets a doe tag. They can shoot either a buck or a doe.
In my deer unit they only allow 50 doe permits for adults during the regular season. Harvesting a doe is easier than harvesting a buck in most cases, so the youth has a better chance of being successful.
The goal of this opportunity is to get kids successful in the early part of their hunting efforts in order for more of them to continue hunting as adults. How many kids would hunt as an adult if they were zero for five in the past five tries as a youth? The answer is not very many.
Please consider taking a kid hunting during this special youth deer season. If you have property that deer occupy, please consider letting a youth and his or her parent hunt there.
Most landowners I know think there are too many deer on the landscape anyway, and this is one way for that number to be reduced. Four youth harvested four does off my property last season and you could not tell the difference in deer densities as a result.
MEA weekend is a time for family and friends. What better way to spend that than with a youth in the great outdoors, and you might even end up with the meat in the freezer as a bonus.
Scott Rall, Worthington, is a habitat conservationist, avid hunting and fishing enthusiast and is president of Nobles County Pheasants Forever. He can be reached at scottarall@gmail.com. or on Twitter @habitat champion