It’s not official yet, but hunters can probably start planning for the sport’s biggest weekend in Pennsylvania — the opening day for the deer rifle season in late November.

The Pennsylvania Board of Game Commissioners on Saturday unanimously gave preliminary approval to hunting and trapping season schedules for 2025-26. The vote followed close to two hours of public comment to kick off the second day of the board’s first meeting of the new year at its headquarters outside of Harrisburg.

A final vote is scheduled at its next meeting, in April.

The dates for deer rifle season place the opener as the Saturday after Thanksgiving, Nov. 29 this year. A Saturday opener has been set each year since 2019. Prior to that, in a tradition that spanned more than six decades, hunters headed into the woods to kick off the cherished season on the Monday after Thanksgiving.

The move has divided Pennsylvania hunters. And many showed up to voice disappointment with the commissioners not addressing what they see as a lethal strike against Pennsylvania’s hunting culture — mainly in rural communities north of Interstate 80 — that has flourished around a three-day, post-Thanksgiving buildup to the Monday hunt.

“You ignore the majority of hunters year after year,” Tim Hamilton, a hunter from Lititz who supports restoring the Monday opener, told the board in reference to its position on the opener. “In doing so, you have lost our trust. We don’t trust you.”

Other hunters countered that their trust in the commissioners has been strengthened by their resolve to stick to the Saturday opener despite the loud opposition.

The commission has cited the opener move as a means to create more opportunities for existing hunters and those new to the sport at a time when participation is spiraling downward.

Commissioners offered no public comment specific to the deer hunting opener before taking the vote on Saturday.

Supporters of restoring the Monday opener are looking ahead to a hearing in February on proposed legislation that would override the commission and permanently set the Monday after Thanksgiving as the opener.

The hearing, set for 9 a.m. Feb. 3, is before the Pennsylvania House Game & Fisheries Committee. Billed as an “informational session,” it will be live-streamed through the committee’s website at pahouse.com/live.

Mike Kreiner, director of government affairs for Pennsylvania Federation of Sportsmen and Conservationists, said in his remarks during public comment Saturday that the hunters who want to see Harrisburg make the decision should be careful what they wish for.

Keeping these decisions within the wildlife community is important because the community has always been like a big family, said Kreiner, whose group has rallied behind the Saturday opener in the years since the initial 2019 move.

“I know that in family squabbles, people get upset when things aren’t going (their) way,” he said while addressing supporters of the Monday opener. “Let’s keep talking. Change can happen. And by you being here today, that’s important.”

The 2025-26 hunting and trapping schedules also includes Sunday hunting on Nov. 16, 23 and 30 — similar to the past few years to cover a variety of game and culminating with the Sunday of the opening weekend of firearms season for deer.

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