| FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: March 14, 2025
Bonus Harvest Authorizations For Spring Turkey Season Available Beginning March 17
Bonus turkey harvest authorizations go on sale March 17, 2025.
MADISON, Wis. – The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) will begin selling bonus harvest authorizations for the 2025 spring turkey season on Monday, March 17, with a designated sale date for each zone.
Previously known as leftover permits, bonus harvest authorizations will be available online through the Go Wild license portal and at all license sales agents. Sales will begin at 10 a.m. and run through midnight each day. Anyone still seeking harvest authorizations may purchase bonus authorizations at this time.
New this year, if hunters do not have a Go Wild user name and password, they will be required to create them. This is to add another layer of protection to Go Wild accounts.
The DNR highly recommends that hunters create their user name and password before Monday, March 17, as they will not be able to make their bonus harvest authorizations purchase before they have created them, which may slow down their purchase experience.
This means that if people are in the queue to purchase a bonus harvest authorization but have not yet created their user name and password, they will not be able to do so until it is their turn to enter the site.
- User name: Must be between 5-20 characters – the system will display if that username is available to the user
- Password: Must be between 8-20 characters and contain:
- at least one numeric character,
- at least one upper-case character,
- at least one lower-case character,
- and at least one symbol (except the “@” sign).
- Password and security answers are case sensitive
Hunters are encouraged to check the turkey zone map and spring turkey bonus harvest authorization availability to see if harvest authorizations are available for the time period and zone they intend to hunt.
Bonus harvest authorizations are $10 for residents and $15 for nonresidents. Both residents and nonresidents have equal opportunities to purchase authorizations. Each zone will have a designated sale date. Hunters can purchase bonus authorizations at a rate of one per day until the zone and time period are sold out or until the season closes. Bonus harvest authorization purchases will not affect preference point status for future spring drawings.
Additionally, the DNR recommends turkey hunters interested in purchasing a Conservation Patron license for the 2025 – 2026 season do so before March 17 to make the bonus harvest authorization process as quick and easy as possible.
The scheduled sale dates for the 2025 spring turkey bonus harvest authorizations are:
- Zone 1: Monday, March 17
- Zone 2: Tuesday, March 18
- Zone 3: Wednesday, March 19
- Zone 4: Thursday, March 20
- Zone 5: Friday, March 21
- Zone 6: No bonus harvest authorizations available
- Zone 7: No bonus harvest authorizations available
Any remaining bonus authorizations will go on sale starting at 10 a.m. on Saturday, March 22.
The Go Wild system will use an online queue to randomly assign numbers to customers who enter the site between 9:45 a.m. and 10 a.m. each day. There is no advantage to entering the site before 9:45 a.m. Customers who join after 10 a.m. will enter the queue in the order of arrival.
All spring turkey hunters must have a valid spring turkey license, a 2025 wild turkey stamp and a valid turkey harvest authorization. If they have not already done so, hunters must purchase their spring turkey license and stamp authorization when purchasing a bonus harvest authorization.
2025 Spring Turkey Season
The spring turkey season is comprised of six distinct periods, each seven days long and running Wednesday through the following Tuesday. A total of seven zones will be open for turkey hunting in 2025. The 2025 spring turkey season dates are as follows:
- Youth Hunt: April 12 – 13
- Period A: April 16 – 22
- Period B: April 23 – 29
- Period C: April 30 – May 6
- Period D: May 7 – 13
- Period E: May 14 – 20
- Period F: May 21 – 27
For more information regarding turkey hunting in Wisconsin, visit the DNR’s Turkey Hunting and Management webpage. |
