Bear Hunt Opponents Vow to Fight On
Posted Nov. 2, 2015 06:00 am | Public News Service
JACKSONVILLE, FL - The fight to save Florida's black bears will go on, as defenders of the bears say after last month's controversial hunt, they are more determined than ever to stop it from becoming an annual event.
Photo:
Florida Forrest Service
Officials with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission have not yet said if there will be another bear hunt in 2016 however, right now state law would allow it.
Adam Sugalski, campaign director for "Stop the
Florida Bear Hunt," says his group will continue to
challenge the legality of hunting bears.
"We're going to try to depose all the FWC members and
see who exactly made this decision," he says. "We need
to trace this back, exactly what happened. And that's
going to happen."
Over the weekend, hundreds of bear-hunting opponents
held a vigil outside Orlando. Last month's hunt, the
first since 1994, was intended to last one week but was
called off after just two days, as 298 bears had already
been killed. The state's objective for the hunt was 320
bears.
The Fish and Wildlife Commission maintains there is a
black bear overpopulation problem, estimating about
3,100 in the state. But officials admit that number
comes from a 2002 survey, which Sugalski says is just
one problem with how the process unfolded.
"When you're shooting lactating mothers, and people
shooting cubs, and they killed three times the amount of
bears in 24 hours, it really shows this hunt was
completely mismanaged from the beginning," says Sugalski.
"They didn't have the correct scientific numbers."
Opponents of the hunt say there are other ways the state
can work to reduce human interactions with bears,
including better management of garbage that lures bears
into neighborhoods, and protecting their natural food
sources. Black bears were listed on Florida's Endangered
and Threatened Species List as recently as 2012.
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