MANHATTAN – If you’re a young hunter interested in learning how to hunt deer or if you are a hunter with a disability and need some assistance, read on. Plans are underway for the 15th Annual Youth-Handicap Assisted Deer Hunt at Tuttle Creek Lake. Kansas youth age 11 through 16 and Kansas residents with a certified disability are eligible. The 2018 hunt will occur Oct. 6-7, during the Pre-rut Whitetail Antlerless-only deer season. 

 Interested hunters must apply by August 25, 2018. Contact Wyatt Cooper with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) at 785-539-8511, ext. 3170, wyatt.m.cooper@usace.army.mil, or Kansas Department of Wildlife Parks and Tourism (KDWPT) game warden Ben Jedlicka at 785-256-3614, ben.jedlicka@ks.gov with questions or to receive an application.

Selected hunters are required to attend a safety presentation and rifle sight-in at the Fancy Creek Range near Randolph on Sunday, September 16, 2018. The pre-hunt sight-in will begin at 4:00 p.m., and sponsors will provide an evening meal for all involved. Hunters should bring their rifle, ammo and an appetite. During the sight-in, Fancy Creek Range instructors will work with participants so they qualify by hitting a "pie-plate-sized" target two out of three shots at 50 yards. License and permit requirements will be discussed. Limited scholarships are available for those in need.

On the mornings of Oct. 6 and 7, hunters and guides will meet for breakfast at 5:00 a.m. at the Tuttle Creek Lake Visitor Center, 5020 Tuttle Creek Blvd., Manhattan. After breakfast, hunters and their guides will travel to hunting blinds, which will be assigned to them before the hunt. Arrangements have been made to have harvested deer transported to and processed free of charge at area lockers

The Riley County Fish and Game Association, KDWPT and the USACE at Tuttle Creek are sponsors of this event. Other contributors include, the Friends of Fancy Creek Range, the Kansas City Chapter of Safari Club International, the Lloyd Johnson Outdoor Youth Fund, and the Tuttle Creek Lake Association. GTB Custom Meats of Riley and Clay Center Locker will provide basic processing of harvested deer free of charge. 

Special hunts and the Fancy Creek Shooting Range facility are examples of beneficial programs funded by license sales revenue and the federal Wildlife and Sport Fish Restoration (WSFR) program. WSFR funding comes from excise taxes on the sale of firearms, ammunition and archery equipment for wildlife and shooting range programs and fishing equipment, boats and motors, and motorboat fuel for fisheries programs. Kansas received nearly $20 million through WSFR in 2017, utilizing license and permit revenue to make the required 25 percent match.

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