House committee approves captive deer-hunt bill

An Indiana House committee on Monday approved a watered-down version of a bill that would legalize high-fence hunting in Indiana.

In an 8-4 vote, the House Natural Resources Committee approved new language for a bill that would grandfather in high-fence hunting ranches that were in business before 2015. But the revised bill wouldn’t allow new ones to open.

Under House Bill 1453, operators of high-fence hunting ranches would have to pay the state an annual $2,000 fee, split between the state’s wildlife and agricultural agencies. Each facility also would be required to have a minimum of 100 acres. The revised bill says the Department of Natural Resources cannot issue rules so restrictive that it prevents the facilities from doing business.

Four high-fence preserves are in operation in Indiana. About a dozen facilities offered hunts before the DNR issued an order in 2005 to shut them down.

The committee’s vote comes a week after the Indiana Court of Appeals voted 2-1 to declare that state wildlife officers overstepped their authority when they tried to ban the controversial practice.

The three-judge appeals panel ruled that the DNR went “beyond the express powers” that state lawmakers granted the agency when wildlife officers ordered all the state’s hunting preserves to shut down.

The judges also declared that Indiana’s law “does not prohibit high-fence hunting of deer.”

DNR spokesman Phil Bloom and Indiana Attorney General Greg Zoeller said they were reviewing the ruling, so it’s unclear whether they’ll appeal to the Indiana Supreme Court.

Another bill, Senate Bill 442 authored by Sen. Pete Miller, R-Avon, would ban high-fence hunting outright. Miller said he drafted the legislation in part because of concerns raised in a four-part investigative series published last spring by The Indianapolis Star. His bill is unlikely to receive a hearing.

Advocates for high-fence hunting say a ban on preserves would deny Indiana’s nearly 400 deer farms an in-state hunting market to sell the bucks they breed, hindering Indiana’s rural agricultural economy.

The farms and the deer they sell are part of a boutique agricultural industry that breeds deer with antlers sometimes twice as large as the record for animals killed in the wild. Valuable breeding bucks and does can command six-figure prices. Some hunters pay $10,000 or more to shoot a farm-raised trophy buck.

Critics counter that hunting farm-raised deer behind fences is unethical and presents a risk of disease being transferred from captive animals to the wild.

HB 1453 would need to pass the House and Senate and be signed by Gov. Mike Pence before becoming law.

Call Star reporter Ryan Sabalow at (317) 444-6179. Follow him on Twitter: @RyanSabalow.