MISSOURI DEPARTMENT OF CONSERVATION

MDC Proposes Adjusting Permit Prices and Wants Public Input

The Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC) is proposing adjusting prices for most hunting, fishing, trapping, and commercial permits in an effort to keep up with rising costs of goods and services it uses to manage its more than 1,000 conservation areas along with nature centers, shooting ranges, fish hatcheries, and other facilities. MDC got initial approval on the proposed permit price adjustments from the Missouri Conservation Commission at the Commission’s May 19 open meeting at City Hall in Washington, Mo.

Missouri is home to more than 1 million anglers, 500,000 hunters, and several thousand trappers. MDC issues nearly 2.6 million hunting, fishing, and trapping permits each year. Most MDC permit prices have remained the same for the past 20 years while costs for goods and services have increased significantly since then.

“In June 1999, the price of a resident firearms deer permit was $17 and the cost of a gallon of diesel fuel was $1.07,” explained MDC Director Sara Parker Pauley. “Jump ahead two-plus decades to April 2023 when the cost of a resident firearms deer permit was still $17 while the cost of a gallon of diesel fuel was $4.08. That cost increase really adds up considering MDC purchased nearly 400,000 gallons of diesel in 2022 to run vehicles and equipment.”

Pauley added that most permit prices would initially be adjusted by a couple dollars or less. MDC would then propose additional prices adjustments as needed in future years.

“Compared to other states, Missouri permit prices are in the middle-to-lower end of the scale and would still be a bargain compared to surrounding states,” she said. “The average price of a resident firearm deer permit for surrounding states is $54 compared to Missouri at $17.

MDC estimates that adjusted permit prices would generate about $800,000 in additional revenue for 2024 and about $2 million annually in the coming years.

Additional revenue from permit sales will help MDC maintain and improve its nationally recognized programs and services for hunters, anglers, wildlife watcher, and others. Conservation efforts supported by revenue from permit sales include:

• Maintaining and improving 15 nature and interpretative centers around the state.

• Maintaining and improving nine fish hatcheries around the state that raise and stock more than 7 million fish annually for public fishing – including about 1.3 million trout at five hatcheries.

• Maintaining and improving more than 70 public shooting ranges around the state.

• Ongoing habitat work on nearly 1,000 conservation areas, including 15 intensively managed wetlands for public hunting and wildlife watching.

• Expansion of popular youth offerings such as the Missouri Archery in the Schools Program, which has reached more than 200,000 young archers at nearly 700 Missouri schools, and the Discover Nature Schools Program, which helps more than 87,000 Missouri students each year at more than 700 schools around the state learn about and connect with Missouri outdoors.

• Helping more than 24,000 landowners create and maintain habitat for wildlife.

• Research on health and sustainability of deer, turkey, quail, waterfowl, songbirds, fish, bears, elk, and other species.

• Evaluation of the effectiveness of harvest regulations for fish and wildlife game species and understanding resource-user preferences.

• Restoration, monitoring, and protection of imperiled and endangered species and habitats.

• Reduction and removal of invasive species that threaten the health of native species and habitats.

Pauley added that most Missourians are generally familiar with some of the work MDC does, but there are new challenges -- with added costs.

“In addition to everything we offer and the work we are known for, we have new and expensive challenges,” she said. “Our staff are dealing with more and new invasive species and wildlife disease outbreaks. And the costs of many things we must buy regularly keep going up, from fuel to fish food.”

Proposed permit price increases include:

• The price of a resident hunting and fishing permit would go from $19 to $20.50. The average price for surrounding states is $42.47.

• The price of a resident fishing permit would go from $12 to $13. The average price for surrounding states is $23.

• The price of a resident small game hunting permit would go from $10 to $10.50. The average price for surrounding states is $26.57.

• The price of a resident trapping permit would go from$10 to $11. The average price for surrounding states is $29.38.

• The price of a resident spring turkey permit would go from $17 to $18. The average price for surrounding states is $47.69

• The price of a resident firearm deer permit would go from $17 to $18. The average price for surrounding states is $54.06.

• The price of a resident antlerless deer permit would go from $7 to $7.50. The average price for surrounding states is $24.21.

For more information on the proposed permit price adjustments, including a complete list of permits, current and proposed prices, average prices of similar permits for surrounding states, the last year the permit prices were raised, and other information, visit MDC online at mdc. mo.gov/PermitPriceAdjustments

Permit sales account for about 17 percent of MDC annual revenue. Other significant revenue sources for MDC include the Conservation Sales Tax at about 62 percent and federal reimbursements at about 15 percent of total MDC revenue.

Sales and rentals, interest, and other sources make up the remaining 6 percent of MDC revenue. MDC receives no funds through fines from tickets or citations, and no funding from the state’s general revenue funds. For more information, read the MDC Annual Review for Fiscal Year 2022 in the January 2023 issue of the Missouri Conservationist online at mdc.mo.gov/magazines/ missouri-conservationist/2023-01/annual-review.

MDC will next seek online public comments through the Secretary of State’s office about its proposed permit price adjustments from July 4 through Aug. 2.

MDC will then compile comments received and share them with the Commission prior to the Sept. 8 Commission open meeting when it will give final consideration to the proposed permit price adjustments. If approved, the changes would become effective Feb. 29, 2024.

MDC Confirms First Zoo-raised Hellbender

Successfully Reproducing in The Wild

The Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC) announces a significant milestone in population recovery efforts of the endangered Ozark hellbender. A zoo-raised hellbender has successfully reproduced within the Current River.

“We are very excited to announce this news,” said Missouri State Herpetologist Jeff Briggler. “This is the first documented event of a zoo-raised animal fathering a clutch of eggs in the wild.”

Rivers in southern Missouri and adjacent northern Arkansas once supported up to 27,000 Ozark hellbenders. Today, fewer than 1,000 exist in the world – so few that the Ozark hellbender was added to the federal endangered species list in October 2011.

Background

Hellbenders are large aquatic salamanders. Missouri is the only state that contains both recognized subspecies of North American hellbenders: the Ozark hellbender and eastern hellbender, both of which are listed as endangered both by the state of Missouri and by the federal government.

The primary threats are habitat alteration and degradation, over-collecting, disease, predation, and degraded water quality. Hellbenders are long-lived (with a 30-year lifespan), slow-to-mature amphibians that seldom venture far within the river.

Numerous wrinkly folds of skin along the hellbender’s sides provide increased surface area for respiration. Capillaries near the surface of the hellbender’s wrinkly skin absorb oxygen directly from the water. Because the species requires cool, well-oxygenated, clean running water to survive, hellbenders are a major indicator of overall health of a river or stream.

The adult hellbender is one of the largest species of salamanders in North America, with its closest relatives being the giant salamanders of China and Japan, which can reach 5-feet or more in length.

Hellbender Restoration

MDC partnered with the Ron and Karen Goellner Center for Hellbender Conservation, a part of the Saint Louis Zoo WildCare Institute, and other agencies in the early 2000s to breed the salamanders in captivity and rear eggs collected from the wild in order to combat drastic population declines. Once the captivebred larvae reached between 3-8 years old, they were released in their native Ozark aquatic ecosystem. Biologists began releasing a few zoo-raised hellbenders in Missouri in 2008, later increasing the number of released animals to 1,000 or more per year beginning in 2012. Since the conception of the breeding and raising of this animal in captivity, more than 10,000 Ozark and eastern hellbenders raised at the Saint Louis Zoo and MDC hatchery have been released into their native rivers.

To help recover this species within the Ozark Highlands, biologists monitor the population status of both wild animals and released animals reared in captivity, as well as locate natural nests within rivers during the fall in order to collect eggs that can be reared and released in the future.

“The majority of the hellbenders existing in the wild and all 10,000-plus released animals have a small chip embedded under their skin with a unique number to allow us to identify the animals in future encounters,” Briggler explained.

Though many have been released to the wild, most hellbenders are only just now becoming mature enough to breed. Because very few nests with eggs are found each year, capturing the event of a male attending a clutch of eggs is a rare event. “We’re lucky to find 20 nests in the wild a year and finding a tagged father that was raised at the Saint Louis Zoo was like finding a needle in a haystack,” said Briggler. “We have been patiently waiting for this significant achievement to occur.”

In October 2022, biologists found that needle when they came across a tagged male Ozark hellbender that was attending a clutch of healthy, well-developed eggs on the Current River. The animal was attending a clutch of 128 eggs. Upon a later return to the nest, the eggs were beginning the process of hatching with the father protecting them. “Our ultimate goal was to see the successful reproduction of a zoo-reared animal in the wild,” explained Briggler. “And we’ve now accomplished that goal in our journey to save the unique Ozark salamander.”

From Egg To Father

This male Ozark hellbender was collected from a natural nest of eggs in the Current River in the fall of 2013 by MDC and National Park Service staff, then transported to the Saint Louis Zoo where the eggs were hatched and reared.

“We have a dedicated team of hellbender keepers, life-support systems technicians, and veterinary staff who work tirelessly to make sure these animals get the best care possible at the Saint Louis Zoo,” explained Justin Elden, Curator of Herpetology and Aquatics at the Saint Louis Zoo, and Director of the Saint Louis Zoo WildCare Institute Ron and Karen Goellner Center for Hellbender Conservation. The Saint Louis Zoo has nearly 20 years of experience and expertise in rearing hellbenders and has their care down to an exact science.

“This experience allowed for this animal to flourish for the six years it was reared at the zoo and prepare it for its release to the wild,” said Elden. “Caring for hellbenders through their lives, from tiny eggs to sub-adults, takes a tremendous amount of work, but it’s absolutely worth it knowing we’re aiding in the conservation of wild animals and wild places.”

The animal was released into the Current River in July 2019. “At the time of release, the male weighed 5.6 ounces (160 grams) and measured 11.8 inches (30 cm),” said Elden. “At the time his nest was discovered in the fall of 2022, he weighed 8.9 ounces (252 grams) and measured 14.4 inches (36.6 cm).”

Based on the hellbender’s size, Briggler noted it was likely the animal’s first year reproducing. “It was exciting to not only see the growth and healthy appearance of this father after living three years in the wild, but to also see such a healthy animal successfully reproduce,” said Briggler.

Eggs generally hatch in about 45 days, but it can take longer with colder water conditions. Upon hatching, the helpless larvae will slowly grow and develop limbs under the protection of the father for several months. In late winter or early spring, the larvae will venture outside the nesting chamber to disperse into the surrounding river habitat. Larvae will breathe with external gills for a few years before they finally absorb their gills and take on the wrinkly appearance of an adult.

“Finding a zoo-raised Ozark hellbender reproducing in the wild is one of the greatest accomplishments for our Zoo’s WildCare Institute conservation efforts and we are incredibly proud to be partnered with MDC on saving this species,” said Elden.

In addition to the Saint Louis Zoo, MDC partnered with the National Park Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Forest Service, and the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission to enhance propagation efforts to ensure hellbenders remain a part of Missouri’s biodiversity.

“It is our hope that such wild breeding events by zoo-reared hellbenders will increasingly become more common as more released animals become mature,” noted Briggler.