"We have been putting an increased emphasis on increasing our doe harvest," said Ron Fowler, Wildlife Program Administrator for the South Dakota Department of Game, Fish and Parks. "We also have a new opportunity for bowhunters to help us harvest a few more does during January."

Fowler is referring to a new law that allows South Dakota bowhunters who have not filled their tags by the end of the year to continue to hunt through the entire month of January! But there's a catch: While an archery license is good for either sex of deer during the traditional season, it will only be valid for antlerless deer during the month of January. So, if you hunt all fall and through December and don't get your buck, you can change the game by hunting antlerless deer for another 31 days.

South Dakota sold 12,995 archery licenses in 2003 and of that total 11,628 were resident archers and 1,367 were non-residents who paid $155 each for their licenses. Residents pay $30 for their licenses ($20 for an antlerless tag).

Three options are available to all bowhunters. You can purchase a statewide archery license (700A), which means you can take a deer of either sex or species, anywhere in the state. Or you can purchase a West River archery license (700C), which is good for either species or sex west of the Missouri River. You could also purchase an East River license (700B), good for any deer east of the Missouri River.

In summary, you can have one license statewide or get West River and East River licenses. All of those licenses are unlimited but are not available over the counter. You must purchase them through the Pierre office of the SDDGFP.

The highest harvest of whitetails occurred last season in Pennington (Rapid City area), Minnehaha (Sioux Falls area), and Brown (Aberdeen area) counties. You'll notice those are major population centers, which skews the harvest statistics and in no way tells you where the best hunting is located.

A total of 3,540 deer were killed by bowhunters last year. Of that number, 2,352 were whitetail bucks, 625 were whitetail does, and 198 juveniles. Mule deer made up the remainder - 266 bucks, 80 does and 19 juveniles. The success rate for bowhunters is 27 percent.

The statistical summary of harvest dates is also interesting. During the period of September and October, bowhunters tallied 28.2 percent of the total archery kill. The month of November was responsible for 52.9 percent of the harvest and December accounted for 18.9 percent of the deer killed by bowhunters. Considering the fact that many bowhunters either are done hunting or choose not to tangle with the elements toward the end of the season, that's a significant kill in December.

Mule deer are also an option in South Dakota. Contrary to popular belief the mulie population is stronger in the prairie counties than in the Black Hills where whitetails dominate. The counties with the highest archery harvest of mule deer are Pennington, Meade, Lawrence, Custer, Fall River and Harding, all in the west and close to the Wyoming border. There are scattered populations of mule deer to the east of there and even a few on the east side of the Missouri River.

To obtain a license to bowhunt in South Dakota, you can visit the game department's Web site and download an application form. Just go to www.sdgfp.info/index.htm and click on "Licenses and Reservations." Or you can call (605) 773-3485.

Wildlife managers need to know they can count on bowhunters to contribute to the control of deer herds, so get out there and do some "lethal managing."

Hey - it's your civic duty!