Michigan Chapter of Backcountry Hunters & Anglers Raises Concerns About Sea Lamprey Control Staff Cuts The recent firing of 12 U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) employees responsible for sea lamprey control in the Great Lakes is a serious concern for Michigan’s fisheries. These staff members played a critical role in managing invasive sea lampreys, and their absence puts Michigan’s aquatic ecosystems at risk. Michigan’s Fisheries at Risk Michigan’s lakes and rivers are vital to both the ...

Michigan BHA Opposes Commercial Targeting of Sport Fish Backcountry Hunters & Anglers (BHA) seeks to ensure North America's outdoor heritage of hunting and fishing in a natural setting, through education and work on behalf of wild public lands, waters, and wildlife. Here in Michigan, we carry out that mission in a truly unique Great Lakes ecosystem. The recently introduced Michigan House Bill 5108 directly threatens that mission by commercializing game fish species long held in the public ...

Camp Grayling expansion may inhibit public land access    Earlier this year, a proposal by the Michigan National Guard to more than double the amount of public lands it already leases from the state of Michigan fast became a hot topic for conservationists in Michigan and beyond.  At its current footprint of 230 square miles, the Camp Grayling Joint Maneuver Training Center is already the largest National Guard training facility in the country. The National Guard since has proposed adding an ...

The Michigan chapter of BHA is the voice for our wild public lands, waters, and wildlife in our great state and seeks to inform members on issues affecting our members as well as public lands and waters in Michigan.  Currently at issue on the upcoming ballot is Proposition 20-1, which would change the definition of projects eligible for funding by one of the foremost public land acquisition funds in Michigan — the Michigan Natural Resource Trust Fund. This ballot measure has effectively ...

This October, the Michigan Department of Natural Resources agreed to purchase the Storey Lake property in Otsego and Charlevoix counties in the North East Lower Peninsula. This win for Michigan sportsmen and women comes after two decades of negotiation and advocacy by sportsmen’s groups. The 2,000-acre property is within Michigan’s primary elk range and contains the formerly private Storey Lake as well as more than a mile of Stewart Creek. This acquisition — in addition to bolstering public ...