Mobile Apps for Licenses & Tagging
Use a mobile app to tag and check in harvested deer, turkey and other game animals? Yes! With the continued “rise of the machine,” wildlife officials across the country are evaluating a whole new way to tag hunter-harvested game animals… smart phones with apps. If all works out, paper licenses and tags may go the way of the dodo bird, since hunters will be able to purchase hunting and fishing licenses online (which they already can), as well as “tag” their deer using an app.
It sounds like a good idea to me. Not only will app reporting allow hunters to document their kill as in the past, but it will also give wildlife officials better information regarding total harvest. This would be great for white-tailed deer and turkey. This improved reporting alone would help with better management of natural resources, which is a good thing. Texas already has an app that can be used to voluntarily report harvest, but I suspect it’s not long before their wildlife department fully adopts it. Arkansas already has a deer tagging app for iPhones up and running live.
Apps Already Used for Tagging Deer & Turkey
Source: Built exclusively for Texas hunters, this official Texas Parks and Wildlife app allows hunters to report harvested game in real-time. My Texas Hunt Harvest keeps track of your hunting season successes and harvest information so you can easily access them on your smartphone or tablet. The app also will help Texas Parks & Wildlife biologists manage healthy game populations to keep hunting great in Texas. With My Texas Hunt Harvest, you can:
- Log your harvested game animals.
- View your harvest history, including dates and locations of every hunt.
- Eastern Turkey hunters can now conveniently check their harvested game with the app instead of having to visit physical check stations.
- After a one-time login, you can easily access your TPWD customer number for future reference.
Mobile phone app-tagging is the way of the future. When fully implemented, that would mean no more trying to find the appropriate tag on your hunting license. Heck, the license itself would be on your phone! Just open the app and digitally tag your game. Done!
Apps the Future of Hunting
Source: “Someday, the Smartphone may be the way we report our harvest,” said TPWD Wildlife Division Director Clayton Wolf. “We’re not even in the early stage yet, but the wildlife harvest app is one of our ways of testing the waters and seeing how things work. We are discussing where we can take it and how much will it cost.”
Wolf said the information obtained if all animals were reported would be costly, but also would save agency time in estimating harvest numbers. For both practical and scientific purposes, the actual and real-time data would be invaluable.
“For deer, we work locker plants and use surveys for a sample of the harvest,” he said. “There’s no doubt electronic reporting would help on data collection and getting better harvest data.”