ORANGE ALERT
PA Chapter NWTF Position on
Proposed Fluorescent Orange Changes.
During the June 24th
PGC Board of Commissioner’s meeting a motion to expand fluorescent orange
regulations was passed by the Commissioner’s, 5 to 1. PGC will accept comments
either by mail or email for 90 days, these proposed fluorescent orange
regulations will be voted for final rule making at the October 7 Commissioner
meeting.
For
Fall turkey hunting, the proposed change would be
250 square inches of fluorescent orange to be worn at all times while hunting
for turkeys. The present regulation
reads that for those areas that allow shotgun and archery only, you have to
wear 100 square inches of orange and that can be a hat or a safety band while
moving and when stationary no orange is required. The rest of the areas that allow rifles along with the shotguns
and bows required 250 square inches of orange while moving and when stationary
you had to display 100 square inches within 15 feet.
For
Spring turkey hunting the new proposal reads to move about or relocate you must wear a hat of
SOLID fluorescent orange. This change now makes orange safety bands, camo
orange hats, or even an orange hat with a logo or advertising on it
illegal!
The PA Chapter NWTF has gone
on record as saying we cannot and will
not support additional orange requirements for turkey hunting.
Citing a nationwide decline in turkey hunting incident
rates that has continued through the present, the 1997 National Turkey Hunting
Safety Task Force recommended against mandatory fluorescent orange requirements
for turkey hunting. Instead, the Task
Force encouraged educational efforts as the most effective method of creating
awareness and reducing incident rates.
Educational efforts in other states include options
such as distributing NWTF safety materials and agency safety messages directly
to turkey hunters. Some states have
increased the emphasis placed on turkey hunting in their hunter safety
education program, offered optional advanced hunter training on turkey hunting
or established mandatory turkey hunter training sessions.
Incident rates have declined in most states since the
late 1980’s without regulations requiring the use of orange by turkey hunters.
Pennsylvania is the only state that requires turkey hunters to wear or display
orange in the spring and one of only a handful with such requirements for fall
hunting.
When orange regulations were originally proposed,
Pennsylvania turkey hunters opposed the action. However, hunters compromised
and accepted the current regulations though they were unpopular. There has not
been a permanent dramatic decline in the rate of incidents associated with
orange requirements here in Pennsylvania. Our membership cannot and will not
support additional orange requirements for turkey hunting.
Current requirements for the use of orange are more
than sufficient. If the goal of this
proposal is to promote simplicity and uniformity in orange regulations, we
would request that the Commissioner’s reduce required amount of orange for fall
turkey hunting to 100 square inches while the hunter is moving, or eliminate
the requirement entirely for both seasons.
Chapter President Carl Mowry is asking fellow members and turkey hunters to please write and email your Commissioners and voice your opinion on this issue.
Please address your comments and letter to all Commissioners and PGC Executive Office, mail to: PA Game Commission, 2003 Elmerton Avenue, Harrisburg, PA 17110-9797. Send your letter, Attention [name], include your name and address. Names to mail your letter to are below.
If you are sending your comments through email to PGC send to this email address: pgccomments@state.pa.us On the email subject line use: Attention: Commissioner [name] or Attention: PGC [name]
Below are the Commissioner names and regions and the PGC Staff names,
Robert
Gilford - District 1, Roxane Palone
- District 2, Russ Schleiden -
District 3,
Sam
Dunkle - District 4, Steve Mohr -
District 6, John Riley - District
7.
Commissioner-Elect, Thomas Boop, Districts 5, Commissioner-Elect, Greg Isabella, District 8.
PGC Staff: Vern Ross, Executive Director, Mike Schmit, Deputy Executive Director,
Michael Dubiach, Bureau of Law Enforcement, Carl Graybill, Bureau of Information & Education,
Cal DuBrock, Bureau of Wildlife Management, Clay VanBuskirk, Bureau of Land Management
Educational efforts suggested by the PA Chapter NWTF
at the Commissioner meeting include but not limited to these ideas for
improving turkey hunter safety.
* Improved turkey hunter
safety materials for use in PGC HTE classes.
* Encourage safe use of decoys and blinds as part of defensive turkey hunting
tactics.
* Support sending safety materials directly to turkey hunters prior to the
season.
* Be certain to emphasize hunter ethics as part of safety education materials.
* Determine the availability of NWTF turkey hunter safety materials.
* Explore the feasibility of using camouflage orange as an alternative to solid
orange.
* Reprint PA-NWTF and PGC cooperative posters for use during turkey hunting
seasons.
* Encourage turkey hunters to use orange responsibly, adhering to PGC
regulations.
* Provide turkey hunter education courses for older, more experienced hunters.
* Examine safety materials used in other states like Tennessee, Kentucky,
Wisconsin, determine applicability to Pennsylvania to develop similar
materials.
* Explore the feasibility of a mandatory turkey hunting education session to
supplement the standard course.
* Determine the feasibility in developing a regulation on roost shooting to
address safety and ethic hunting concerns of early and late shooting hours.
* Communicate with the NWTF Turkey Hunting Safety Task Force to help
design and distribute attractive and readable materials to turkey hunters.
* Develop additional funding methods to implement these suggestions and
recommendations.
Send mail to panwtf@go2pa.com
with questions or comments about this web site.
Copyright © 2003 Pennsylvania Chapter- National Wild Turkey Federation
Last modified: November 20, 2003