Senate Bill 2861

(As Passed the Senate)

AN ACT TO AMEND SECTION 49-7-13, MISSISSIPPI CODE OF 1972, TO ALLOW TRAPPERS TO SELL SKINS AND MEAT AFTER THE CLOSE OF TRAPPING SEASON; TO AMEND 49-7-65, MISSISSIPPI CODE OF 1972, TO CONFORM; AND FOR RELATED PURPOSES.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF MISSISSIPPI:

SECTION 1. Section 49-7-13, Mississippi Code of 1972, is amended as follows:

49-7-13. (1) Any resident of the state sixteen (16) years of age or older, upon application, is entitled to receive a state trapper's license with tag for the sum of Twenty-five Dollars ($25.00), plus the fee provided in Section 49-7-17 * * *. This license shall be required of each helper or assistant sixteen (16) years of age or older employed or used by a trapper.

(2) No person shall trap * * * on the lands * * * of another * * * unless he has the permission of the landowner * * *.

(3) Each trap shall have an identification number * * * permanently inscribed * * * on the trap or attached to the trap by a metal tag. * * * Every trapper shall * * * visit his traps at least every thirty-six (36) hours. The conservation officer may take up any traps not properly marked.

(4) No person shall place or set a trap on or within one hundred (100) feet of any street or public road. Public roads shall not be construed to mean public waterways.

(5) This section shall not apply to a landowner trapping on his own lands except subsection (4).

(6) A trapper shall be allowed to trap * * * fur-bearing and predatory animals during trapping season, and sell the pelts during the trapping season and for ten (10)days after the close of the season. The meat of legally acquired raccoons, opossums and muskrats may also be bought and sold during trapping season, and for ten (10) days after the close of the season.

SECTION 2. Section 49-7-65, Mississippi Code of 1972, is amended as follows:

49-7-65. Except as provided in this chapter, it is unlawful for any person to hunt, trap, take, kill, wound or capture, or attempt to hunt, trap, take, kill, wound or capture any fur-bearing animals * * * except during the open season prescribed by law or regulation, or to have in his possession the green pelt of any such animal except during the open season and ten (10) days after the close of the open season. However, mink may be hunted with dogs during the season for taking of fur-bearing animals on payment of trapper's license fee by person so hunting mink with dogs.

SECTION 3. This act shall take effect and be in force from and after July 1, 2005.