By 
During West Virginia’s long, green summers, thoughts of short days and chilly weather seem impossibly far away. But for excited groups of deer hunters, summer kicks off the West Virginia Division of Natural Resources annual lottery deer hunts.
This story was originally published in the July 2025 issue of Wonderful West Virginia. To subscribe, visit wonderfulwv.com.
Written by Laura Jackson
Photos courtesy of West Virginia Department of Commerce
Every year, the West Virginia Division of Natural Resources (WVDNR) prepares for its state park–controlled deer hunts and its antlerless permit hunts. Plenty of eager hunters want to participate, and names are drawn, lottery-style, to join the challenge in various state parks, public lands, and counties around the state. In 2024, hunters scurried through the forests of Camp Creek and Greenbrier state forests, Hillcrest Wildlife Management Area, national forest land in Pocahontas County, and public land in Boone, Clay, Greenbrier, Kanawha, Nicholas, Randolph, and Webster counties.
It’s a lot of land and a lot of hunting potential.
State Park–Controlled Hunts
The WVDNR has been holding controlled hunts at West Virginia state parks for several years. The original catalyst for holding these hunts was damage to agricultural crops in affected areas. Dillard Price, acting chief of the Parks and Recreation section, says they’ve become increasingly popular. They’re a chance for hunters to explore new terrain and places where they’d normally never tread.
The lottery system is set up within the WVDNR Electronic Licensing System (ELS). It opens in July and runs until September. “You can hunt with a friend, if you want to, and sign up as part of a group,” Price says. “We have a lot of fathers and sons, fathers and daughters, and buddies who want to get together.”
For these state park hunts, a $15 fee is required per permit application, and names are pulled as autumn arrives. Then, officials reach out to the winners to confirm that the chosen hunters will be able to attend. A list of alternates is also compiled, should spaces become available.
The next step is for park superintendents to identify hunting areas and designate them on park maps for the lucky winners. Hunters, who need to remain within their designated areas, get a safety briefing as well as a rundown of the rules and regulations of the park and how to interact with guests. “We put out signs for park visitors,” Price says. “It’s all about communication and letting everyone know what’s going on. We stress awareness and education.”
While the hunt is a rare opportunity for a unique West Virginia experience, the exercise is perhaps even more important for controlling deer populations, as Price can attest. “I was a superintendent at one of the parks where we started this,” he says. “It made a big difference in the number and the volume of deer and their health, overall. It also helped with some of those typical issues we have—for example, deer eating our young shade trees—especially within the campgrounds.”
Hunters in 2024 were drawn for Beech Fork, Cacapon Resort, Bluestone, and Twin Falls state parks, and the WVDNR will be adding North Bend, and Pipestem Resort state parks to the 2025 site list. “It’s entirely up to the park superintendent and their staff as to which parks they hunt, how many folks they want to allow, and what weapon types, like if it’s going to be a muzzleloader hunt or a crossbow and bow hunt only,” say WVDNR deer project leader Brett Skelly. But no matter the locations or regulations, there are hunters jumping at the opportunity year after year.
Antlerless Permit Hunts
Antlerless permit hunts are another type of lottery-based activity for hunters hosted by the WVDNR. Here, the deer dictate the locations for the hunt, and the WVDNR uses a scientific, data-driven approach when managing population numbers. Skelly and the District Biologists and Wildlife Specialists determine how many permits will be allocated based on the best available data. “Those recommendations then go to our Natural Resources Commission, which is how all of our seasons and bag limits get set for wildlife and for fish,” he says. “And they vote on those recommendations. They can choose to modify them if they need or want to, based on public input. Once the lottery hunts are approved, they become part of the annual hunting regulations. It’s at that point when hunters can go online to the WVDNR ELS at WVhunt.com and apply using their WVDNR identification number.”
The WVDNR offered a limited number of 2024 permits for antlerless hunts in wildlife management areas, on private and public land in designated counties, and in national forests in October, late November, and several stretches in December. Unlike the state park hunts, there’s no cost to apply for antlerless permit hunts.
The Natural Resources Commission approves big game regulations during its second quarterly meeting in late April or early May, and the lottery application period opens to hunters in July. Between 2,000 and 4,000 hunters typically submit 4,000 to 6,000 entries, Skelly says, in order to include their second choice if they’re not drawn for their first, provided permits are still available. About half of the names that are submitted are drawn sometime in mid-September, and Skelly’s office facilitates getting the Anterless Lottery Permit cards mailed out to those hunters. Overall, it’s a lot of help with wildlife management. “From my standpoint, we’re helping craft how many deer we want harvested in these areas,” he says.
Decisions about deer populations are data-driven. Skelly uses a lot of different metrics to determine whether a deer population is increasing, decreasing, or remaining stable. One technique is buck kills per square mile. Another is spotlight distance sampling. “We go out at night and drive 30 or 40 miles of rural routes in these counties and count deer. This gives us an estimate of density.” He also looks at crop damage reports and takes sociological factors into consideration, including public complaints.
Tales from the Hunt
While the WVDNR is hard at work with hunt organization and population dynamics, the hunters are preparing. Bob Hogsett, of Huntington, was one of the lucky past winners. In fact, he’s been drawn several times for hunts at North Bend, Beech Fork, and Pipestem Resort state parks.
“I got a nice doe at North Bend,” he says, recalling a unique encounter. “I bought a crossbow, and I’m not a very good hunter, but I am a pretty good shot. I was out there, and I took a little nap, and when I opened my eyes, about 10 yards away was a very nice doe. I raised the crossbow up just a little bit, sighted it, pulled the trigger, and got the deer with a neck shot.”
Hogsett hunted by himself that day but never felt alone. “The park rangers at all three places were just really marvelous,” he says. “I was treated so well. They want to make this type of hunt as nice and hospitable as they can. And my North Bend hunt ended up a little more successful than the one at Pipestem.”
Kenny Davis has been lucky, too. The Hurricane resident and host of the long-running television show Whitetail Frenzy was drawn for a hunt at Twin Falls State Park in the fall of 2023. He was allowed to scout the area ahead of time to put up trail cameras. Within three days of the hunt, he was also allowed to hang tree stands, provided no trees were damaged.
The adventure began with a safety briefing at the lodge so all participants were aware of the rules and regulations as well as where they were allowed to hunt in the park. “We could harvest two deer,” Davis says. “Two does, or a doe and a buck, and we did not have to harvest a doe prior to harvesting a buck.”
Davis and his cameraman chose an area where his trail cams had shown a lot of deer activity. “I shot a doe,” he says. “We saw tons of bucks over the next two and a half days. It was a great time. We ate at the restaurant and stayed at the lodge every night, and the food was awesome.”
Whitetail Frenzy has been airing on national television for over 10 years and has recently become available on YouTube, where most of the content has been based in West Virginia. Over the years, countless viewers have messaged Davis to ask about hunting in the Mountain State. He’s proud to showcase his home turf to out-of-state hunters who are looking for a new experience.
Davis began hunting long before his television show, however. “I grew up in a fairly poor family in Cabin Creek, West Virginia,” he says. “We hunted then. We loved it, and it was something we did as a tradition, as a family, but we didn’t worry about trophy size. We needed the food, and it’s something through my childhood that I fell in love with.”
Now, he uses his platform to spread the word about West Virginia as a deer-hunting destination. “West Virginia isn’t nationally known as a state that produces giant deer, but over the years, we just harvested so many big bucks here.”
He also highlights the positive relationships between the hunting community and the WVDNR. It has a job to do, and although enforcement of rules and regulations may seem like an obstacle at times, every decision is made for the benefit of West Virginia wildlife and the outdoor recreational community.
You can visit WVhunt.com for licensing information. Any hunter selected for a state park–controlled lottery hunt must have a valid West Virginia hunting license prior to selection or within one week of being contacted, or they must be legally exempt from being required to purchase a license. State park–controlled hunts are subject to state hunting regulations—however, any deer harvested when participating in one do not count against that hunter’s total bag limit for the year’s deer season.
By 
