By Billy Davis

A public meeting to discuss deer-hunting legislation has been set for Friday, February 5.  

The meeting, scheduled for 5:30 p.m., will be held at the North Miss. Fish Hatchery at Enid Lake.

The meeting, organized by state Rep. Warner McBride, was cancelled last week due to inclement weather.

Officials with the state Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks were set to travel from Jackson to the meeting, he said.

McBride has organized the meeting after receiving public input about the pending bill.

The proposed legislation, House Bill 1282, which would add gun-hunting days to the calendar, has created controversy among some hunters.

The bill was written and introduced Rep. Bo Eaton of Taylorsville, who chairs the House Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks Committee.

McBride voted in favor of the bill in the committee.

The full House is expected to take action on the bill as early as this week.

The Miss. Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks is supporting the legislation.

The increase in legal gun-hunting days comes after Mississippi has seen a jump in its white-tailed deer population, a wildlife biologist told The Clarion-Ledger.

But the Mississippi Bowhunters Association is opposing the bill because it moves up primitive weapon season to November 1, a period normally reserved for bow hunting.