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March – The Transition Month – Crappie and Trout
By Frank Jezioro – Director, West Virginia Division of Natural Resources
I normally don’t fish until the “bugs” come out, but the grandkids wanted to go and remembered that last year we had some good days on Stonewall Jackson Lake fishing for crappie. The great thing about crappie fishing is that there always seem to be enough to keep the kid’s attention. Kids like success and action in whatever they are doing to hold their attention. Put...
posted Thursday, March 4, 2010 at 12:27 PM by Frank Jezioro
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Winter Fun When You Can’t Go Hunting
By Frank Jezioro – Director, West Virginia Division of Natural Resources
Hunting is my passion, as my friends and family will quickly tell you, and I do it whenever I can make the opportunity. Most hunting is, by tradition and biological necessity, a cold weather activity reserved for the winter months. Hunting essentially ends in February with the closing of the seasons for bobcat, raccoon, fox, rabbit, hare and my favorite, grouse, although you can...
posted Friday, February 5, 2010 at 3:07 PM by Frank Jezioro
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January and Grouse Hunting Go Together
By Frank Jezioro – Director, West Virginia Division of Natural Resources
An eerie quietness has fallen over the land as I ready the dogs for an afternoon of grouse hunting. The only sound is the soft tinkle of the little sleigh bell around Deuce’s neck and the rustle of the wind as it works its way through the tall old hemlocks where we have parked. It is a cold bleak day in early January and gone is the distant hum of the logger’s chain saw.
Also...
posted Tuesday, January 5, 2010 at 10:44 AM by Frank Jezioro
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By Frank Jezioro – Director, West Virginia Division of Natural Resources
It started snowing about an hour after dark and quit about midnight. That meant that any track we found would be smoking hot. With a good rig dog on his platform we started out across the mountain at daylight. We hadn’t gone more than a mile or so when the dogs blew up. Not only the rig dog but the dogs in the boxes were letting us know a bear had crossed the road. Checking the track it...
posted Wednesday, December 2, 2009 at 10:40 AM by Frank Jezioro
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By Frank Jezioro – Director, West Virginia Division of Natural Resources
Changes in the deer herd populations and the locations of these herds have drastically changed the deer hunting traditions.
I grew up in Marion County and back then, as in many counties, there were no deer, certainly not enough to hunt. The closest real deer country we had was in Preston County.
If you knew someone in the Kingwood, Bruceton Mills, or Tera Alta areas, you could hunt there and have a good chance of...
posted Monday, November 30, 2009 at 10:49 AM by Frank Jezioro
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By Frank Jezioro – Director, West Virginia Division of Natural Resources
While we have had early seasons for doves, deer and ducks, the true hunting season for most West Virginia hunters will kick off in October. That’s when the fall turkey, deer and bear archery seasons will open, as well those for squirrel and grouse. Times and traditions have changed drastically over the past 50 years since I started hunting.
When squirrel hunting was a big event
Back then, the opening of the...
posted Monday, November 30, 2009 at 10:48 AM by Frank Jezioro
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Dove Hunting Ushurs in Fall Hunting Season
By Frank Jezioro - Director, West Virginia Division of Natural Resources
Each September 1st signals the beginning of another fall hunting season in West Virginia. For many years the first day of September has been the traditional opening of dove season across a wide swath of the United States. For such a small bird, dove hunting, or better phrased, dove shooting, is a major event. The farther south you go the bigger event it becomes with...
posted Thursday, October 29, 2009 at 9:13 AM by Frank Jezioro under Hunting