Make Your Voice Heard!

George Washington enjoyed nothing more than riding with his hounds on his property at Mount Vernon.  Of course, with the exploding population and the associated fragmentation of land into smaller and smaller parcels, complaints submitted to the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries (VDGIF) have increased with each passing year.  Because of this, VDGIF established the Stakeholder Advisory Committee for the Hunting with Hounds in Virginia to make recommendations related to the future regulation of hunting with hounds.

The Committee recommendations are now available for public comment until September 12.  The document containing all of the Committee’s recommendations can be viewed by clicking here and hard copies can be requested by calling (540) 231-0961.  It is critical that the hunting community actively participate in this process in order to ensure a bright future for our hunting heritage.  Radical anti-hunting groups like the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) actively advocate for an end to all hunting in America but have specifically targeted hunting with hounds over the last many years.  HSUS sympathizers have been engaged in the process and hunters in the Commonwealth must counter them.

Comments can be submitted at public meetings scheduled through September 9, but comments made between now and September 12 will be considered.  For a schedule of these meetings, click here.  Written comments may be emailed to  [email protected] or sent to:

Hound-Hunting SAC
c/o Sarah Kozlowski
111 Cheatham Hall
Department of Fisheries & Wildlife, Virginia Tech
Blacksburg, VA 24060-0321