Never too early to think about spring hunting opportunities

With hunters across the Silver State focused on filling their big-game tags or bagging some birds, it may seem a bit premature to talk about spring hunting opportunities, let alone worry about tag draws. But if you would like to take advantage of Arizona’s spring hunting seasons, the time is now to shift your focus, if only for as long as it takes to buy your hunting license and submit your permit-tag application.

The application process for Arizona’s 2021 spring turkey, javelina, bison and bear hunts is underway. Applications must be submitted online at azgfd.gov by 11:59 p.m. on Oct. 13. To start the application process, all you have to do is click on “Apply for a Draw.”

However, to apply you are going to need an Arizona hunting license that is valid the last day of the application period. You can purchase a license online if do not have one that meets those requirements. Nonresidents must purchase a combination hunting and fishing license at a cost of $160 for adults 18 years of age or older. But youth ages 10-17 pay only $5, the same as a resident youth. That is a pretty good recreation bargain and will give them what they need to hunt quail when that season opens.

Young hunters also get a deal on youth-only hunts for wild turkey and javelina, hunts in which they can participate until they reach their 18 th birthday. If they apply only for youth-only hunts, the cost of permit tags for wild turkey and javelina is just $25 and $30, respectively, while adult nonresidents will pay $105 and $115. If a youth hunter includes choices for the general javelina hunt on his application, he will be required to pay the higher fee.

Nonresident bear-permit tags are $165 regardless of one’s age, while a bison bull-permit tag will set you back $5,415. A cow bison permit-tag is $3,265.

I took my first turkey on a spring hunt in Arizona. My friends and I hunted the Kaibab Plateau north of the Grand Canyon where pine trees reach toward the sky. It was a good hunt.

Dove hunt opens

Hot, dry and slow. Those may well be the words that best describe the first week of the 2020 mourning dove hunt. Hunters found some success early on for resident birds, but it did not take long for hunting pressure to put those birds in full migration mode.

If you have been out and found bird numbers to be a little thin, do not get discouraged. As of this writing, overnight temperatures in Elko, Eureka and White Pine counties dropped to the low 20s, causing the National Weather Service to issue hard freeze warnings. Then consider what must be going on further north in Idaho, Montana and beyond. The key word is cold.

Here in the Las Vegas area, overnight temperatures dipped into the 60s for the first time in a while. Not as drastic of a change as in those northern areas, but taken altogether these drastic changes in the weather should be enough to jumpstart the dove migration and encourage any birds that have been holding up to move in this direction.

Opening day action is generally driven by resident bird numbers because it is still hot at the beginning of September, even in areas to the north. Then, as nighttime temperatures in those areas begin to drop near the 50-degree mark, migrating doves begin moving south. That means we do not generally see a lot of migrating birds in Southern Nevada until mid-September or even later.

By that time many of us have turned our attention to other pursuits, which means there will be fewer hunters in the field even as bird numbers increase. An old biologist friend of mine who for years managed one of Nevada’s wildlife management areas once told me that since most wing shooters tend to focus only on the opening weekend they miss some of the best dove hunting of the fall.

So, you may not want to put that shotgun away just yet.

Freelance writer Doug Nielsen is a conservation educator for the Nevada Department of Wildlife. His “In the Outdoors” column is not affiliated with or endorsed by the NDOW. Any opinions he states in his column are his own. Find him on Facebook at @dougwritesoutdoors. He can be reached at intheoutdoorslv@gmail.com