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SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) — A trapping season that was the subject of a legislative bill this session enters its second week Saturday.
The Nest Predator Bounty Program is in its seventh year. It opened for South Dakota resident youth under 18 on Saturday March 1. The program is for youth only until it opens to South Dakota adults on April 1.
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Jaquie Ermer of the South Dakota Game Fish and Parks told the GPF commission on Friday this was the fourth year of the youth only season.
The program pays a $10 bounty for raccoons, striped skunks, badgers, opossums, and red fox. Those animals are considered a threat to nesting birds like pheasants.
“The species are the same as last year,” Ermer said.
Republican Rep. Scott Odenbach’s bill to cut the GFP spending for the nest predator bounty program in favor of spending the money on habitat for nesting birds was sent to the 41st day in the House Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee. Odenbach cited the roughly $4 million spent on the program since it started.
During legislative committee discussion, Tom Kirschenmann of the GFP said no general fund money or Pittman/Robertson federal money is used for the program. Hunting licenses pay for the bounty, he said.
The bounty season ends on July 1 or when $500,000 in payouts are reached. Participants can submit up to $590 worth of tails per household, according to the GFP website.
Ermer said on Friday during the GFP commission meeting that the department had scheduled collection dates around the state during the bounty season. The first collection date is Tuesday, March 18. At least 10 sites are listed for collection that day.
Adults who are not trapping the predators on their own land must have a hunting, fishing or furbearer license. Licenses are not required for youth or adults trapping on their own land.
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About 290,000 nesting predators have been removed since the program started in 2019 at the direction of then-Gov. Kristi Noem. The program has had 14,000 participants, Kirschenbaum said during the February legislative committee meeting.
“Ninety-five percent of those removed in 2024 were from primary pheasant range,” Kirschenmann said in February.
One of the goals of the program is to encourage youth to participate in outdoor activities, GFP officials have said.
Ermer reported to the GFP commission in July of 2024 that youth submitted 1,700 animal tails that year. Youth participation had grown from between 12% to 13% of all participants in 2019 to 46% in 2023 and 2024, Ermer said.
The GFP commission decided in 2023 to continue the program through 2026.
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