Legislators have given the go-ahead to change South Dakota’s bighorn sheep hunting license auction.

The legislative Rules Review Committee approved on Monday state rule changes eliminating the Nov. 1 license application deadline and allowing the auction winner to hunt bighorn sheep in the Badlands hunting unit, a large swath of land surrounding the Badlands National Park. The legislators didn’t discuss the changes before approving them.

The changes are part of a larger push at the Game, Fish and Parks Department to drum up nationwide interest in the license auction after the world record ram was bagged in Pennington County last year. GFP officials believe the auction bids could jump to hundreds of thousands of dollars.

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