DELAWARE - Governor Matt Meyer recently signed House Bill 278 into law, which expands hunting in Delaware by removing restrictions that had previously limited doing so on Sundays.
Delaware officials say the new law takes effect immediately and permits sportsmen and women to hunt all game animals and game birds during designated hunting seasons. It should be noted that private landowners and public agencies can still dictate whether hunting on Sundays is allowed on properties they own or control.
Sunday hunting was prohibited entirely in Delaware throughout most of the 1900s. A 2016 law allowing deer hunting on five specific Sundays in limited circumstances was the first to change that. In 2024, restrictions were further loosened and Sunday hunting was expanded to include game-bird species.
HB 278 also affects the law governing the use of certain types of ammunition for deer hunting. Delaware allows the use of rifles for hunting deer, but only those chambered for straight-wall handgun ammunition. This is because those rounds are more accurate than shotgun slugs and more efficient for harvesting deer quickly while losing energy rapidly, which is a safety advantage in a flat but populated state like Delaware.
According to State Representative Jeff Spiegelman, this change expands the allowable caliber size to include popular deer hunting rounds like the .400 Legend.
Finally, the new law also addresses an inadvertent glitch in state law that had barred hunters from Sunday hunting during the January deer handgun season.
HB 278, championed by the Delaware Sportsmen's Caucus, received broad, bipartisan support and won approval in the Senate 19-0 and in the House 38-1.
