A century ago, unmanaged hunting and the fur trade had nearly wiped out Nebraska’s big game. The 1900 Census of Wildlife in Nebraska showed the depth of the devastation of this once-plentiful land: just 50 deer and 100 pronghorn in the entire state. No more bison, elk, prairie wolf or bear, and even beavers and river otters all but gone.

            Today, thanks to careful game management, huntable species are again plentiful across Nebraska. Deer and pheasants are found throughout the state, and the wild turkey population has doubled in the last five years. Nebraska is at the heart of the Central Flyway for ducks and geese, and the Missouri River flyway attracts large numbers of waterfowl as well.

            Nebraska has one of America’s largest huntable populations of sharptail grouse and prairie chickens. A small but growing elk herd, and pronghorn in northwest Nebraska, provide unique opportunities for a smaller number of hunters.

            Hunters also face challenges in Nebraska, the biggest of which is finding a place to hunt. All of the wildlife management areas, National forests and grasslands, refuges, and other public areas open to hunting total less than 1 million acres of land, less than 2 percent of Nebraska’s land base. Nebraska’s public land is concentrated in the western part of the state, while the state’s human population is concentrated in the east.

The Conservation Reserve Program – Management Access Program (CRP-MAP) also provides walk-in hunting opportunities on about 180,000 acres of private land.  Nebraska has over 1 million acres of public land managed by the Board of Education Lands & Funds that is leased for farming and ranching, but the agency traditionally has not considered those as ‘public access’ lands.

The Nebraska Wildlife Federation is working to meet these challenges, which face Nebraskans whether they like to hunt, watch wildlife, camp, hike, or just enjoy natural areas and wildlife:

In our work on the Platte River Cooperative Agreement, we stood fast to ensure that the 10,000 acres of habitat to be protected in the Central Platte under the program is open for public hunting and other recreation, where appropriate;

In our Farm Bill work, we support efforts to expand USDA conservation programs, and to provide preference in awarding CRP contracts to landowners willing to open their land for public recreation through programs like CRP-MAP;

We are fighting against efforts to hamstring agencies like Game & Parks and the Nebraska Environmental Trust with short-sighted restrictions on their ability to acquire land for habitat conservation;

We are investigating the opportunities to open the more than 1 million acres of Board of Education Lands & Funds public land to public hunting and other recreation.

We urge you to join us in these efforts, by joining the Nebraska Wildlife Federation.

For more information on some of Nebraska’s most popular huntable species, see our Huntable Wildlife Page.