TENNESSEE LEGALIZED DEER BAITING WITH NEW $50 BUY-IN

Tennessee Governor Bill Lee flipped a 10-year ban on its head earlier this month when he signed House Bill 938 into law. Effective July 1, 2025, Volunteer State hunters can now legally hunt whitetail deer over bait on private land, provided they pay the state an appropriate fee to participate. This change, introduced by Representative Kip Capley and Senator Joey Hensley, ends Tennessee’s long-standing prohibition on hunting over bait, aligning the state with more than 22 others, including neighbors like Arkansas, Kentucky, and Georgia.

“A lot of other states allow hunting over bait anyway, like Texas and several other states, so that’s my reason for supporting it,” state senator Joey Hensley, a primary sponsor of the bill, said. “I just don’t think that people should be penalized because they’re hunting over bait, especially on their property. That’s what this bill does, but it requires people to get a license that would generate additional revenue.”

It’s about the $50 and nothing else baiting was stopped to keep deer from gathering in one area supposedly to avoid the spread of CWD.

I thought that Tennessee was supposedly concerned with CWD? Funny how they aren't concerned with it anymore if there is $$$ to be made. Money must be the cure.

Agree or disagree with baiting, because "other states do it" and $$ are not reasons to change policies.

supposedly Mi. is considering baiting again for a 20.00 permit and a neighbor who has cattle said they don't have to test for disease this year

OK, so baiting with a license on private land will be legal WITH a permit, but....who's going to be out checking for bait anymore now, and if it's on private property how does anyone know anyway? and why would they be on private land to check?
Hole thing doesn't make much sense, in essence a money grab.

Jealous neighbors will turn each other in when they shoot "their" bucks.

Not much the Government doesn’t own that they won’t try to sell you it’s just creative taxation but if you don’t get a permit then it’s forced taxation either way they get the money.

They'll sell It because people will gladly buy it. If no one buys, it'll go away.


Pa doesn't even allow plain old feeding because of CWD, in areas they claim it to be. Neighbor had a salt lick in his back yard so he could watch deer but a warden stopped in one day and had him take it down or be fined.

A conspiracy theorist might think they'll have this for just a few years to build a list of private land owners who like to bait. After a few years, or whenever the growth rate slows down on the list of baiters, they'll stop it. Then hand the list to wardens and tell them to watch these properties for illegal baiting.

But I'm not a conspiracy theorist, so I don't think that's the plan.

that would assume they have the resources to enforce it

much more likely the budget for DNR was in a bad way and 50 dollars x 20K people willing to pay it , 10 counties get to keep their warden and not got a warden per every 2 counties

they already knew people were doing it and likely with not nearly enough agents to do any meaningful enforcement , so just tax it and give people who will drop 300 on corn a month a way to do it legal for 50 bucks

and if you do catch someone baiting with out a bat tag , triple the tax to 150 as the fine , they will pay it and move on.

It’s a shame the only solutions to remain functional is to tax people more and more do they ever look at other cost saving options?

Tenn Wildlife Resources Agemcy recently lost a court case regarding COs going on private property without a warrant and had to change some regulations accordingly Now that COs can't trespass on private property to check for baiting, the state is making baiting legal as long as a fee is paid. Shameful behavior on the part of the state in both situations.

Here I am 5 miles from the Tn line in Va, where feeding deer at any time of year is now illegal due to CWD, and 5 miles away baiting is legal. Doesn't make much sense.

I am not interested in hunting deer over bait and didn't do it when I lived in Ky where it is legal. Regardless, I think the prohibition on the basis of slowing or stopping CWD spread makes as much sense as not moving firewood to stop the spread of the Emerald Ash Borer. Neither has been effective in any meaningful way as far as I can tell.

I hunt over bait in WI. Well, It's a 50-tree apple orchard. I haven't done It yet, but I plan on growing some soybeans between the trees. The orchard is abandoned.

That reminds me of the prohibition on baiting doves. If you cut open a bag of bird seed and hunt over it, that's illegal. But if. you spread that same bird seed a few months early, let it sprout and grow, then mow or burn it at the start of dove season, you can hunt over that.. That is not "baiting". Its manipulation of agricultural crops, which is legal.

Baiting prohibitions do not prohbit baiting. They prohibit "poor man's" baiting.

I hunt over an apple tree also, the only one on my 44 acres, but the apples are long gone before hunting season opens.

Whenever the baiting topic comes up here at work, one guy smiles and says "I am just a really bad farmer".

Game wardens...nationwide....are becoming public land only enforcement. But, that's what ya'll want...right?

That way all landowners can worry about & solve their own problems.

It'll be a great day to be a game warden soon....no calls from any citizens to help solve their petty problems with their neighbors or poachers. Everybody can just kill what they want, where they want, and how they want to kill it! Hoorah!!

GWs can just get up every day and go patrol the WMAs and Refuges and let the private landowners fend for themselves.

I retired too soon!

Our COs lost the open field doctrine here also recently.

What TN has just done proves that the politicians only pay attention to the Biologists when it is convenient for them. This is just another way for them to suck revenue from the honest folks. The crooks were already baiting and poaching and will continue to do so. They do not need no stinking permit!