ShareTraveler isn’t up there with the Washington Post or even the Jefferson City News-Tribune in keeping up with the antics of legislative bodies and persons who aim to legislate the proper use, regulation, misuse or even permissive freedoms pertaining to natural resources. But even we couldn’t helput notice there are four…count them, four…bills in the [...]

ShareArchery deer, turkey harvests up from last year
Counties bordering urban areas had the biggest totals.
JEFFERSON CITY–Bowhunters posted increases in both deer and turkey harvests during Missouri’s 2011-12 archery deer and turkey hunting seasons, topping the previous year’s figures by more than one-third
Hunters checked 52,671 deer during the four-month archery season. That is an increase of [...]

ShareTurkey hunters have until Feb. 29 to apply for managed hunts during Missouri’s 2012 spring turkey season. All 19 managed turkey hunts are listed in the “2012 Spring Turkey Hunting Regulations and Information” booklet. The booklet, along with other information on spring turkey hunting, is available online at www.mdc.mo.gov by searching “Spring Turkey Hunting.” The [...]

Share( Assistant ed. note: Ok, so the headline is a little facetious. In 2011, the Missouri Department of Conservation recorded 14 confirmed mountain lion sightings, more than other confirmed sightings in the last 75 years combined. )
MDC News Release Jan. 5
CENTERVILLE–The Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC) has examined and released a male mountain lion trapped [...]

Share(MDC news release.)
JEFFERSON CITY – Conservation has a place in Missouri’s news mix every year, but 2011 will go down in history for more than the fact that the Missouri Department of Conservation began its 75th anniversary celebration in November. Forests, fish and wildlife had a particularly prominent place in 2011 news
WILDLIFE RESTORATION
2011 began on [...]

ShareIn the cold of this winter, while you’re cleaning and repairing your fishing gear for next season, one of the action items new for 2012 is the new prohibition against felt-soled waders in Missouri streams, especially trout streams.
Brian Waldrop of Stream Team 211, Arnold, shared this Missouri Dept of Conservation video on Facebook. [...]

ShareBy Jo Schaper
I was filing some things today at the office and ran across a little 8.5 x 5.5 inch MDC pamphlet called “Know Missouri’s Trout.” It probably came as a result of Traveler’s recent visit to Bennett Spring State Park, one of the four Missouri state trout parks.
Knowing Missouri trout should be [...]

ShareDecade-Long Collaboration of Zoo and Federal, State Scientists Yields 63 Baby Hellbenders
The Saint Louis Zoo’s Ron Goellner Center for Hellbender Conservation and the Missouri Department of Conservation today announced that Ozark hellbenders have been bred in captivity—a first for either of the two subspecies of hellbender. This decade-long collaboration has yielded 63 baby hellbenders
The [...]

ShareJEFFERSON CITY–Hunters checked 190,089 deer during Missouri’s 11-day November firearms deer hunt, slightly surpassing last year’s figure despite a slow start on opening weekend.
Extremely windy weather, combined with reduced deer populations in some areas, dropped the opening-weekend harvest 10,000 below the 2010 figure. Hunters persevered, however, and more than made up lost ground in the [...]

ShareAn increase in this year’s fall firearms turkey harvest could be the first concrete evidence that Missouri’s wild-turkey population is recovering.
The Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC) Telecheck database shows that hunters checked 7,077 turkeys during the fall firearms turkey season Oct. 1 through 31. Top harvest counties were Greene, with 209 turkeys checked, Franklin with [...]