Can You Go Hunting at the Abilene State Park?
The question was asked, "is Public Hunting permitted at the Abilene State Park?" That's a tricky question that I can answer with yes. However, there are a couple of steps to go through before you can hunt.
If you're thinking "great I've got another place to hunt" think again, only the lucky ones can get a permit to hunt and in some cases, you may not get to hunt the "state park or your choice."
First off what kind of hunting is permitted and what time of year it's allowed? The kind of hunts that are permitted at the Abilene State Park are deer-bow-hunts, deer-rifle-hunts, youth-deer-rifle-hunts, shotgun-duck-hunts, mentor-hog-hunts, and hog-trapping.
The Abilene State Park's Ranger, Candyce Johnson says "yes hunting is permitted but one must sign for a draw hunt permit allowing only a certain amount of hunters the privilege to hunt at the Abilene State Park.
All hunting is done during certain times of the year, at times the park is completely closed down due to hunting for the public's safety.
The deer-bow-hunt takes place near Lake Abilene, and it's within the first few weeks of the regular bow season. The Adult deer-rifle-hunt is the first two weeks of December, with the youth deer-rifle-hunt the last week of December and/or the first week of January. Then there's the shotgun-duck-hunt the last two weeks of January.
As for Mentor-Hog Hunts and/or hog trapping, these are arranged with our local state park. Ranger Candyce Johnson says "these are all pre-planned, but I wished we could eradicate all hogs in our Abilene State Park because there are so many and they're so destructive."