This past Saturday ended the 2025 firearms deer hunting season, but if you hunt with flintlock or bow, you’ll get added opportunities to tag a buck or doe.

For flint lockers, the upcoming season runs statewide from Dec. 26 to Jan. 19 and from Dec. 26 to Jan. 24 in WMUs 2B, 5C and 5D. For archers, the statewide season also runs from Dec. 26-Jan. 19 and in WMUs 2B, 5C and 5D.

Hunters who hold unused antlerless licenses, there’s the extended firearms for antlerless deer in WMUs 2B, 5C, and 5D, and DMAP areas, from Dec. 26-Jan. 24 and in WMUs 4A, 4C, 4D and 5A, from Jan. 2-19.

If you’re a small game hunter, there’s the statewide rabbit, pheasant and squirrel seasons that kicked-off Dec. 15-24 and will run from Dec. 26-Feb. 28. And if you hunt the north woods area where they live, snowshoe hare season runs Dec. 26-Jan. 1.

Of course, there’s always fox, coyote, bobcat and others whose season ends Feb. 21 for fox, Feb. 22 for fox and coyotes, and Feb. 4 for bobcat.

And don’t forget crows that have no bag limit with their season running until March 22. Crows are numerous and plentiful as I see flocks of 20-30 in local fields and in towns since they’re trash scavengers where they often pick the white trash bags apart for leftover food. Ironically, few if any hunters hunt them.

In case you haven’t seen them, snow geese have arrived. I spotted a sizable flock (with a few Canada geese mixed in) last week in a field on Mauch Chunk Road on land that belongs to GES (Trojan Powder Company). Earlier in the week I likely saw the same flock flying East towards a quarry outside of Northampton that they annually put down on. It’s amazing how they remember that spot year after year. The resident population zone regular season for them runs until Feb. 21 and the conservation season until April 24.

The Pennsylvania Game Commission cited an expanded season this year was able to add Sunday hunting days that gave hunters 13 Sunday’s to hunt. And in looking ahead to the 2026-27 hunting seasons, the PGC Board of Commissions can consider adding more Sunday opportunities, says the PGC.

ICE FISHING REPORT

As of last Friday, the Tackle Shop reports Tobyhanna had 4-8 inches of ice with 3-6 inches of snow on top.

At Hills Creek State Park, the lake edges are solid with no problem accessing the ice at either boat launches. They marked roughly 5 inches of mostly black ice at both the Pine Launch and Beaver Huts launch.

Over on Beechwood that had 3 inches of snow on the lake and 5-5.5 inches of mostly black ice, Beechwood was due to be stocked with trout on Dec. 15.

Ice angling at this time appears to be in the Pocono area and northern tier of the state. We need continued below freezing temperatures for local lakes to freeze. Waters such as Mauch Chunk, Leaser Lake, Ontelaunee and Lake Minsi take much longer.