ion to the following letter dated May 22, 2002 from Ed Hamrick, Director, West Virginia Division of Natural Resources:

“Pursuant to the May 20, 2002 request from Agriculture Commissioner Gus Douglass regarding the eight county dog training moratorium, and having received prior approval from the Governor, in accordance with Chapter 20, Article 1, Section 7, I am taking appropriate steps to implement this action.

“I have imposed a 60-day closure of the hunting and dog training season, effective at 12:00 p.m. Noon on May 24, 2000 in the counties of Grant, Hardy, Pendleton, Greenbrier, Monroe, Fayette, Hampshire, and Mineral.

“It has been reported that while low-pathogen Avian Influenza is not a threat to human health or wild bird populations, it can be spread by people, animals and contaminated equipment to other poultry flocks.”

PKC will be in touch with Director Hamrick on this matter. Obviously, permits for night hunts will not be issued during this moratorium. It is the position of the sporting dog community that it is highly unlikely that a hunting dog would be able to access an infected flock of penned domestic turkeys and contract this disease to be spread then to an additional previously unaffected flock. We will try to reason with the department on behalf of the hunters.

Should you have a PKC hunt scheduled for one of these counties, please contact Mike Craney at 800-238-5009 so that your cancellation may be posted in the hunt schedule in PROHOUND and on PROHOUND Online.