Deer hunting

OGDEN -- Because of a new management plan adopted late last year, wildlife officials in Utah are recommending a small reduction in the total number of permits issued to hunt buck deer in the state this fall.

CHEYENNE, Wyo. -- The Wyoming Game and Fish Department is pushing to change state law to allow baiting of big game animals, a tactic it says could allow hunters to lure nuisance whitetail deer away from towns to spots where it would be safe to shoot them.

The Legislature's Joint Travel, Recreation, Wildlife and Cultural Resources Committee is sponsoring a bill in the legislative session that starts next month at the request of the game department.

In addition to giving the state Game Commission authority to bait wildlife, the proposed bill would simplify state law in regard to what specific weapons are allowed for hunting particular game animals.

JACKSON, Miss. -- When he first saw the antlers, taxidermist Ellis Soloman called it "a pineapple rack."

And Mark Clay says trying to measure the buck his son Will Clay, 14, killed on the opening morning of the youth gun season Nov. 5 "is like trying to score a briar thicket."

The 15-point fits all those descriptions, and more. It has antlers sprouting in seemingly every direction.

Its left main beam, where most of the atypical growth is located, is difficult to discern.

It has not been scored, but, nonetheless, it is a trophy, and a story worth sharing.

Using hay bales for a make-shift blind in the middle of a five-acre pasture on family land in Madison County, father and son were hoping to see the big buck Mark Clay had spotted during scouting.

TWIN FALLS, Idaho -- Jordan Beard stood in his game room -- detached from the rest of his Twin Falls home -- talking about how he bagged the animals mounted on the walls and shelves.

A stately caribou from Alaska, a mountain lion from Utah, a couple of mule deer from Idaho. He took one of the deer heads off the wall, a four-point buck he harvested last year in the South Hills. He recently got back the finished mount from Intermountain Taxidermy and Worldwide Adventures in Twin Falls.

This is a man crazy about hunting. But he didn't go at all this year.

Sure, Beard was busy. But the late start to 2011's fall weather was a discouragement -- and not just for Beard.

Deer seasons were off to a slow start this year, according to Idaho Department of Fish and Game and area hunters. And weather was a big factor.