Hunting license expiration date arrives; time to register for 2024-25
The expiration date of the 2023-24 annual hunting license came Thursday, a few hours after time ran out on the Ohio rabbit season.
Also Thursday, legal trapping ended in most of the state for mink, muskrat, beaver and river otter. A trapping window limited to a few counties around western Lake Erie remains open through March 15 for mink, muskrat, opossum, skunk and weasel.
Then it’s goodbye to all that until autumn.
Crow season winds up Sunday as a break begins for nesting season. Crow hunters need to hold a 2024-25 hunting license to partake in the finale. The season resumes in early June and continues on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays through the first Sunday of March 2025.
While an annual adult resident license costs $19, youths as old as age 17 along with seniors age 66 and older pay $10.
The same license mandate applies for hunters of feral pigs, coyotes and groundhogs, the seasons that don’t close. People who hunt none of the above and instead are aiming for the spring turkey hunt can hold off a bit on shelling out for a license and permit.
The youth turkey hunt runs April 13-14. The regular season begins April 20 and finishes May 19 in central Ohio.
Holders of multiyear licenses might need to check whether the one they possess is still valid. The sale of 3-, 5-, 10- and lifetime multiyear license began in 2018, suggesting some 3- and 5-year licenses purchased in the long-ago need replacement.
Multiyear hunting licenses expire on the applicable anniversary date of purchase.
Annual resident fishing licenses, which are valid for one year starting with the purchase date, cost $25. Seniors pay $10. Ohioans not yet 16 years old don’t need a license to fish.
Stamp winner
A painting depicting a male bufflehead duck gliding above its reflection along a burnished water surface saturated in shades of orange, violet and red won the 2024 Ohio Wetlands Stamp Design Competition.
The rendering by Ray Easton of Webster, New York, will appear on the 2025 stamp. Finishing second among 34 original works was a painting of three blue-winged teal by Frank Dolphens Jr. of Omaha, Nebraska. A snow goose by John Brennan of Lutz, Florida, was judged third by a five-person panel.
An American wigeon pair painted by Sam Timm of Wisconsin will appear on the 2024 stamp.
The purchase of a $15 Ohio Wetlands Habitat Stamp is required for persons 18 years or older who hunt waterfowl and migratory birds. Birders and other conservationists purchase stamps because proceeds are used to enhance wetland habitat.
The stamp program has raised more than $11 million for wetland conservation since its inception in 1982, the Ohio Division of Wildlife reported.
Parting shots
The public is invited to wildlife division district offices Monday through Friday this week to ask questions and offer comments about proposed hunting and trapping regulations for 2024-25. The District One office is located at 1500 Dublin Road, Columbus. … Fishers, carnivorous members of the weasel family that prefers forest habitat, are recolonizing Ohio, the wildlife division reported last week. Fishers were extirpated by the mid-1800s but have moved into at least nine northeastern Ohio counties from their digs in Pennsylvania. … The Maumee River’s famed walleye run generally heats up in March. Despite the mild winter, moreover, the fish have been reluctant to advance the timetable. Local anglers were waiting for a good rain to swell the river during a spring without much runoff from snow melt, trusting that’s also what the walleye have been waiting for.
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Hunting license expiration date arrives; time to register for 2024-25
