Interior Secretary Doug Burgum’s official hunting and fishing access order is now at the center of a fight over local hunting restrictions in National Park Service units where hunting is already allowed. Burgum signed Secretarial Order 3447 in January 2026, directing Interior agencies to expand hunting and fishing access, remove unnecessary barriers, and ensure consistent policy across department-managed lands and waters.
Now, an April 21 internal memo and park-by-park spreadsheet have raised questions about how that order will apply to local hunting restrictions created by park superintendents and land managers. Interior and the National Park Service haven’t publicly posted those documents, so the park-level details should be handled as an internal rollout rather than a publicly released rule.
The issue centers on federal lands where hunting already happens, especially National Park Service units with local rules covering weapons, dogs, developed areas, carcass disposal, and other site-specific concerns.
Not Every Park Is Huntable
Burgum’s order doesn’t open Yellowstone, Grand Canyon, Glacier, or other major national parks to recreational hunting.
Federal law still controls where hunting can happen inside the National Park System. The NPS says hunting is authorized in 76 units, trapping is authorized in 31 units, and about 51 million NPS-managed acres are open to hunting.
Under federal regulation, hunting may occur in park areas where federal law specifically mandates it. Hunting may also occur where federal law authorizes it as a discretionary activity, but only if the superintendent determines that it’s consistent with public safety, public enjoyment, and sound resource management.
So this fight isn’t about making every national park huntable. It’s about local restrictions in parks, recreation areas, preserves, riverways, and other NPS units where hunting already exists.
Local Rules Under Review
The Interior order applies to NPS units where hunting is already allowed, but where park managers have added local restrictions for safety, habitat protection, sanitation, or conflicts with other visitors.
Those rules differ by park and by purpose. In some places, they limit where hunters can fire weapons near roads, trails, campgrounds, picnic areas, or other developed areas. In others, they regulate hunting dogs, baiting, night optics, carcass disposal, blaze-orange requirements, or where hunters can clean game.
- At Curecanti National Recreation Area in Colorado, current NPS guidance says hunters must be at least 100 yards from roads, trails, campgrounds, picnic areas, facilities, and other developed areas before discharging a weapon. It also says hunters can’t shoot toward, across, or from any visitor-use area.
- In Ozark National Scenic Riverways in Missouri, the NPS says hunting dogs must wear collars or tags with the owner’s name and phone number. The park also requires hunting dogs to remain within reasonable proximity to their owners.
- At Lake Meredith National Recreation Area in Texas, the 2026 superintendent’s compendium includes several hunting-related restrictions, including blaze-orange requirements during certain deer seasons, bans on night vision and thermal optics while hunting, a ban on baiting wildlife, limits on visible carcass disposal, and a ban on cleaning or processing game animals in restrooms.
The Interior’s position appears to be that those kinds of local rules should be removed unless they’re required by law, or unless park managers can show they’re the minimum necessary for public safety or resource protection.
For hunters, that review could mean fewer duplicative rules and less confusion across federal lands. For park managers, it could also mean losing local tools used to prevent conflicts in places where hunters, hikers, campers, boaters, and other visitors share the same ground.
State Rules Matter, But NPS Authority Still Applies
State wildlife laws still matter on NPS lands where hunting is allowed. However, they don’t erase federal authority inside park units.
Under 36 CFR 2.2, authorized hunting and trapping must follow federal law and the laws of the state where the park area sits, as long as those state laws don’t conflict with federal rules.
That gives park managers room to keep restrictions when they’re legally supported and tied to safety, resource protection, or visitor conflicts. It also gives Interior room to challenge restrictions it considers unnecessary barriers.
That’s the friction point now.
Why Hunters Should Watch This Closely
Hunters and anglers have good reason to support more access on public land. Access keeps getting tighter, private ground keeps getting harder to reach, and inconsistent federal rules can make basic recreation harder than it needs to be.
However, hunting also depends on public trust. Rules around trails, campgrounds, dogs, carcasses, weapons, and developed areas aren’t automatically anti-hunting. Some are practical guardrails that keep hunting defensible on shared public ground.
If Interior removes outdated or unsupported restrictions, hunters may gain clarity and opportunity. If the department removes practical safety rules without careful review, it hands critics an easy argument against hunting on public land.
Check the Rules Before You Hunt
Hunters shouldn’t assume park rules have changed until the relevant unit updates its public guidance. Before hunting on NPS-managed land, check the park’s hunting page, the superintendent’s compendium, and state hunting regulations. If those sources conflict, call the park office before you go.
Part of a Broader Interior Push
This story also fits a larger Interior pattern around hunting access and state wildlife authority. In March, Interior announced a proposed rule for Alaska national preserves that would restore state-aligned hunting and trapping regulations. The Federal Register proposal says NPS would amend rules for hunting, fishing, trapping, natural resource harvest, and procedures used to restrict public use and access in Alaska park lands.
That Alaska proposal is separate from the park-level memo, but it points in the same direction. The Interior is moving hunting and fishing access higher on the priority list.
The Takeaway
Burgum’s official access order is moving into the messier world of local park rules.
For hunters, that could mean less red tape and more consistent access on federal lands. For park managers and other visitors, it raises real questions about how much local authority will remain when safety, sanitation, and resource concerns are specific to one place.
The fight now centers on which local restrictions count as necessary, and which ones the Interior considers unnecessary barriers.
Read the full article here