LANSING — A years-long dispute over Michigan’s coyote hunting season could be finally coming to a close.
The Natural Resources Commission voted this week to establish two new coyote seasons that span the entire year, likely putting to rest a pushback from Michigan hunters.
A standard hunting season will take place from Oct. 15 to March 1, while a management season will span through the warmer months.
Those seasons allow coyotes to be hunted under different circumstances — the hunting season is for recreation and the management season is a method of population control.
”We just want to balance the wildlife, the effect coyotes have on wildlife, and that’s the biggest issue right there,” said Gary Gorniak, president of the Straits Area Sportsmen’s Club. “We don’t want to wipe out the coyotes — we want to manage them.”
Gorniak argues that managing coyote populations through hunting is more humane than natural factors, like starvation or disease.
Coyote hunting is currently allowed nine months out of the year, with a break from April to July.
That change was adopted in 2024 and was supported by animal rights groups, who argued that summer hunting could endanger young coyotes who may lose their parent.
Some conservation groups sued the NRC over the original coyote hunting change, arguing that the policy wasn’t based on scientific evidence.
Hunter groups now say they’re satisfied with these new rules.
“We should be able to just move forward with this and and have sound management,” said Merle Jones, a spokesperson for the Michigan Trappers and Predator Callers Association. “It provides the tools to deal with those issues at a targeted location in a timely manner, and it also gives the tools for us to continually manage the overabundance on a statewide basis.”