With the turkey dinner done, some Iowans are turning their thoughts to venison and today’s opening of a three-day antlerless deer season.

Tim Litchfield, a state deer biologist at the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, says the idea behind the hunt is to cut down the number of does to help keep the overall deer herd in Iowa in check. The timing is planned for now to try and get the maximum number of hunters. He says many people have extra time off during the Thanksgiving holiday and they felt it’d be a good time to get people involved.

This is the first antlerless hunt and he expects thousands to take part overall. Litchfield says last year they sold around 12-thousand licenses, and he expects there’ll be 13 to 14-thousand licenses sold this year. Not everyone with a license will come home with a deer. He says 40-percent of those who buy a license typically end up shooting a deer.

Litchfield says the late harvest could impact the hunting success. Litchfield says with the corn still standing in many areas of the state, the deer will use it like a forest as cover.

Litchfield says hunters are required to report their kills within 24 hours. Litchfield says the fastest way to report a kill is to go on-line. He says the information is important in figuring out the hunting quotas for the state. Hunters can report their deer on the D-N-R website at: www.iowadnr.com , or by calling the toll free reporting number: 1-800-771-4692. You can also report your deer kill at the place where you bought your license.