State combines winter, spring hunting application

The new application period is Nov. 1 to Dec. 31. It replaces an old system that featured two different application periods -- one in the winter and one in the spring.

The department made the change to one winter drawing permit application period for all resident hunters to make things less confusing for hunters and cheaper for the department, said regulations program director Suzan Bowen.

For the past eight years, the state had two application periods for drawing Tier I and II permits. There was a Nov. 1 to Dec. 5 winter application period for Dall sheep, mountain goat, Kodiak brown bear, Koyukuk moose and some other moose hunts, followed by a May 1-31 application period for all other permit hunts.

Two application periods sometimes confused hunters, many of whom applied for permits during both. Having just one application period should help hunters avoid mistakes that in some cases disqualified them from winning a permit in past years.

Hunters are allowed to apply for three hunts for any one species and the two-application-period system sometimes resulted in hunters applying for too many hunts, a mistake that disqualified them.

"People would apply for a couple of moose hunts in the winter draw and a couple more in the spring draw and then get kicked out of the system," analyst programmer Kurt Kamletz said.

The winter drawing period will also give more hunters more time to plan. Hunters will know whether they get a permit sometime in February or March, Bowen said. Previously, hunters who applied for permits in the spring drawing didn't find out whether they got a permit until mid-July.

The cutoff for submitting paper applications will be Dec. 15. The deadline for online applications will be Dec. 31. It takes longer to process paper applications, Bowen said.

About half the hunters apply online.

"We're trying to get people to do it electronically," she said. "It increases efficiency across the board."

Applying online also benefits hunters by alerting them to mistakes on their application, such as applying for the same hunt twice or applying for too many hunts for the same species, Bowen said.