A hang-up for hunters

Changes in ammo an early inconvenience as the season opens.

Published online on Wednesday, Sep. 17, 2008

For deer hunters such as Aaron Walls of Fresno, Saturday's opener is an annual family tradition.

Walls and his brother have spent hours scouting. They've installed remote cameras on game trails. They've purchased deer and bear tags for D7, the state hunting zone that includes most of eastern Fresno and Madera counties, and plan to be in the mountains Friday night.

This year, the only difference is the type of ammunition Walls and other local hunters are packing to comply with California's recent ban on lead bullets within 2,385 square miles of condor range. Zone D7 is the northern and easternmost area covered by the new law.

Walls will follow along, even though he doesn't agree. After some checking, he went out and purchased a box of copper bullets for his 7 mm magnum rifle. It cost $58, almost double a similar box of lead.

"I've been hunting D7 since I passed the safety course and I've never seen a condor," Walls said. "It's just a way to make some money off hunters, and it's an extra hassle for wardens."

The sentiment is a common one at the Department of Fish and Game regional headquarters in Fresno. Twelve deer hunters were interviewed this week as they exited the building on Shaw Avenue. All knew about the ban on lead bullets; none was happy about it.

"I think it's a joke," said Barry Milner of Tollhouse, who drew a deer tag to hunt in the Eastern Sierra outside the no-lead zone.

Nonetheless, lead poisoning can be fatal to California condors, those large soaring scavengers rescued from extinction by state and federal agencies, zoos and conservation groups that spent tens of millions of dollars breeding 300 birds in captivity since the 1980s. About half have been released into the wild.

A recent report by a panel of scientists concluded that condors cannot survive without a lead ammunition ban across their vast range, which includes parts of California, Arizona, Utah and New Mexico. But noting the cost and effort required to feed, nurse and protect wild condors, the authors wrote, "that one might argue they constitute little more than outdoor zoo populations."

The DFG has helped educate the public about the lead ban, which took effect July 1, by printing information in hunting pamphlets and on deer tags in the affected zones. Answers to most questions and a list of certified non-lead bullets and packaged ammunition can be found at www.dfg.ca.gov/wildlife/hunting/condor/.

But now that it's hunting season in the Sierra, enforcement takes center stage.

DFG Central District assistant chief John Baker said blatant non-lead violators can expect to be cited but "honest mistakes" will be handled case by case. Hunters contacted in the field by a game warden should expect to hand over their firearms for inspection.

In coastal A zones, where deer season began Aug. 9, Baker said overall hunter-warden contacts are down significantly, but most hunters are complying with the new law.

Another development, which Baker found "a little disturbing," is hunters who don't sight their rifles for copper bullets, which have different properties than lead.

"I would hope that anybody serious about hunting would at least put three rounds in and find out what they shoot like before going out," Baker said.

Even though the legislation provides subsidies to hunters who purchase more expensive non-lead bullets, the state has yet to fund it.

Hunters can expect to find difficult conditions on opening weekend caused by months of dry weather and small numbers.

Katie Oneida, co-owner of the Wishon Village RV Resort, said photographs of "three or four deer and three bears" taken during archery season are displayed on her bulletin board.

Dennis Beard, who owns the nearby Dinkey Creek Inn, said the most commonly seen bucks are 2-year-old forked horns and underage yearlings.

"It's tough out there -- you can go all day long and see two or three animals," Beard said. "The herd is down, and everybody knows that."

Following a busy opening weekend, officials expect hunting traffic to die down until the season's first storm drives the deer to lower elevations, where they are more accessible. If that happens before the Nov. 2 closing date for D7, success rates will get a bump.

Deer season in zone D8, which includes Tulare County and portions of Fresno County south of the Kings River, runs from Sept. 27 to Oct. 26.

Local hunters continue to lag behind statewide hunter success rates compiled by the DFG.

In 2007, California hunters posted an estimated success rate of 18% and a reported success rate of 10%. In zone D7, 367 of 9,000 deer tags were returned for a reported success rate of 4.1%. The estimated success rate for D7 is 6.4%.

In zone D8, for which 7,310 tags were issued, the hunter success rates are 5.7% (reported) and 8.9% (estimated).

Tags for D7 are sold out. More than 2,000 remain for D8.