Fall Squirrel Season Opens

[peter]

Kentucky's fall squirrel season is a 196-day split season that kicks off the calendar of fall hunting.

The first segment of the fall squirrel season opens Aug. 17 season closes on Nov. 8. The season opens again Nov. 11 and runs through Feb. 28, 2014.

The daily bag limit is six squirrels.

"I'm predicting this fall's squirrel season will be as good as last year, maybe better," said Ben Robinson, small game biologist for the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources. "In the limited time I've been afield, it looks like we're going to have a good mast year."

There's a close relationship between a year's nut production and the following year's squirrel population levels. Last fall's mast survey rated white oak and hickory nut production as average, red oak as good and the beech nut crop failed.

"I've heard that beech trees in eastern Kentucky are loaded with nuts this year," said Robinson.

The department's annual mast survey, held since 1953, begins on Aug. 15 and runs through Sept. 1.

Biologists survey the foods that are most important to Kentucky's forest wildlife such as squirrels, white-tailed deer, wild turkeys and bear. They walk the same route every year and estimate the year's mast crop based on what they observe.

"After this information is compiled we'll have a clearer picture of the year's mast crop and the likely impact on wildlife populations," said Robinson.

Weather extremes, such as late frosts and heavy rains in spring and summer droughts, can limit the amount and quality of mast.

Hickory nuts begin to mature in August and acorns and beechnuts in September and October. Late winter is the time when food availability becomes most critical to squirrels and can impact their body condition heading into the breeding season.

Squirrel hunters can help management efforts by taking part in the Squirrel Hunting Cooperator Survey. The voluntary program, which started in 1995, supplies information that biologists use to monitor squirrel population trends in Kentucky.

Hunters record information about their hunts as the season progresses, including the county hunted, hours spent afield along with the number and species of squirrels seen and harvested. Hunters also document how many hunters were in the party and the number of dogs used to find squirrels.

When hunters are finished hunting for the season they simply mail in their survey. Logs are available online at fw.ky.gov by clicking on the Hunting, Trapping & Wildlife tab or by calling 1-800- 858-1549. Logs must be returned to Kentucky Fish and Wildlife no later than May 31, 2014.

Each year, after the survey information is compiled and analyzed, a report is mailed out to squirrel hunters who shared the details of their hunting activities from the previous season.

Last season, the survey detailed 1,123 squirrel hunts in 69 Kentucky counties. Hunters reported they saw 5.5 squirrels per hunt and bagged 1.9 squirrels per hour.

Hunter effort was greater towards the beginning of squirrel season as 69 percent of the hunts took place in August, September and October. About five percent of the squirrel hunts and harvest occurred during both January and February.

Statewide, 81 percent of the harvest was comprised of gray squirrels, suggesting gray squirrels are more abundant. The data also shows Kentucky squirrel hunters prefer to hunt in forests rather than woodlots and fencerows, the habitat where fox squirrels are most often found.

"Over the years both gray and fox squirrel numbers have remained fairly stable," said Robinson, "with cyclic ups and downs in population based on weather and mast availability."

This fall, hit the woods and enjoy the hunting that started many down the path of the outdoor life.

Author Art Lander Jr. has been writing about the outdoors since the 1970s. He is a staff writer for Kentucky Afield Magazine.

[Drew1233]

Thanks for all the info! Love to eat some fried squirrel!! Will have to get out there and shoot em up! Only got 2 in the spring.

[Colbyt]

If they don't leave my tomatoes alone, it is going to open a couple of weeks early around here.

[Moveon]

If they don't leave my tomatoes alone, it is going to open a couple of weeks early around here.

If I had know that squirrels ate tomatoes I'd have trapped and removed all the squirrels from my garden neighborhood area years ago. But I don't garden or grow tomatoes anymore. And I really miss having home grown tomatoes this time of the years.

But I still trap and remove squirrels. I have one in my trap right now as I'm typing this note. I didn't even have any bait inside the Havahart Live Animal Trap either. He just went into the cage on his own.

I highly recommend the large Havahart Live Animal Trap for getting rid of squirrels, stray cats, Raccoons and Opossums. I just hope that I never have a skunk in my trap!

Wondering if I remember how to skin a squirrel? haha. Squirrel Season doesn't start around here until the 15 th of August. I'll take him somewhere else and release him in a wildlife area away form people's garden and bird feeders.

This is the fourth fox squirrel that I've caught in my trap and taken elsewhere. Pretty soon there won't be any more squirrels in my neighborhood. But that may take a few years to get them all. I really doubt that I will get them all. There are too many and by the time I catch a few they will have already raised their young. And other's simply move into the vacated area. They just come from father away.

I enjoy watching them when they play in the trees across the street from my house. Over there is a big oak tree that's about 175 ft to 200 ft tall and I can see it looking out my back window by the kitchen. I'm standing by this window preparing food or doing dishes and such and look out the window a lot. During Jan the squirrels are mating and I see them chasing each other around and up and down that big tree. Right now the maple trees in my back yard block the view but when they drop their leaves I'll be able to see the big oak tree across the street again.

I was really surprised to find the squirrel in my animal trap this morning. But that's one less squirrel that will be eating my bird seed.

I put the trap up on the top of the rail that runs around the outside edge of my wood deck on the back of the house. The squirrels were using the rail to walk to the bird feeder which is at the back right hand corner of the deck. I raised up all the other bird feeders on long poles and then put squirrel guard (cones) around the poles. I had noticed the tops of the bird feeders being dislodged an could not figure out how that was happening. Then I saw the squirrels getting into the bird feeders and eating the peanuts out of the feeders and moving the lid to get into the peanuts. That's when I extended the length of the poles and added the squirrel baffles (cones).

But I added one more bird feeders with sunflower seeds to the fish cleaning station that's mounted onto the corner of the deck rails. I use that wooden platform to clean my fish at the end of the day. It's right near the garden hose so I can use the hose to clean the fish. And I have a drain built right under this part of the deck to drain away any water that collects under the deck and also the water from my gutters. I ran a 4" od correlated PVC pipe from one of the rain gutters outlets to this drain. The drain goes out into the back yard and connects into a 8" OD PVC pipe drain system that I put in the back yard to channel the rain water under my yard instead of over the top of the ground. All I need to do every once in a while is drop in a few mosquito larvae killing tablets to keep the mosquitos from breeding in the water inside the pipes. I feed the tablet into the gutters and the chemicals dissolved out of the tablet and into the water that flows down into the drainage system. It works good at keeping the mosquito population down.

I use to try to clean fish at night and would be carried away by the mosquitoes. I didn't know where they were coming from until I thought about the opening of the drain system being right under my feet at that part of the wood deck. I use to have to take my Thermacell out onto the deck while cleaning my fish at night. Now I don't need to do that anymore. Well once in a while there's a few mosquitoes. Can't get rid of them either.

The type of mosquito larvae killing tablets that I use to buy are no longer sold at Walmart of the other stores. They were smaller pill shaped. The only ones I can find in the stores are the side of a small golf ball now. But they work so that's ok

[Colbyt]

They really don't eat them. If the did I might call it sharing the bounty. The drag them across the yard, take a bite and leave the rest. So they just waste them.