Sandhill Crane Hunting Season Opens

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Kentucky’s second annual sandhill crane hunting season is officially underway. 332 hunters were granted permits to bag two birds each.  The season will last until Jan. 13, or until 400 birds are killed. Rocky Pritchert is a migratory bird specialist for the Division of Fish and Wildlife. The initial plan is for sandhill crane hunting to last at least three years, and Pritchert says the state evaluates the results of the hunt every year.

"That’s part of the process," he says. "Then after three years, we’ll evaluate the three-year span in its entirety and then make recommendations from that."

Pritchert says the eastern population of sandhill cranes is at healthy levels, and something devastating would have to happen to bring the population to the point where Kentucky would call off the hunt.