Outdoor Adventures

[ksquared]

Good news du jour...

The hell with the hunt opponents... Now back to wORk...

State OKs bear hunt in Dec.
By Rob Jennings, Daily Record

The state Divison of Fish and Wildlife approved Tuesday a six-day black bear hunt in December, but opponents vowed to block or shorten what would be New Jersey's first bear hunt in 33 years.

In an 8-1 vote -- Jack J. Schrier of Mendham Township was the lone dissenter --the division authorized the hunt as part of the 2003-04 state game code. Members cited escalating property damage reports and the risk to people posed by aggressive bears.

While the code stipulates a hunt from Dec. 8 through Dec. 13, it also permits state Department of Environmental Commissioner Bradley M. Campbell to end it after two days.

The hunt would be restricted to areas north of Route 78 and west of Route 287, where black bears breed most heavily. The state plans to issue up to 10,000 hunting permits. Hunters may take male or female bears, without limitation as to size.

Campbell said after the vote that a hunt was "appropriate," but he reserved the right to call an early end "if the take of bears appears excessive."

The game code does not specify a target number of bears to be killed and Campbell did not get more specific, saying he was waiting for additional data on the statewide bear population to be compiled later this summer and fall. Current estimates range from 1,500 to 3,200 black bears in New Jersey.

"The data, by any reckoning, documents an increasing population," the DEP commissioner said.

Council member George Howard of Pittstown said he wanted a minimum of 500 bears to be killed in the hunt.

"If we want to maintain bears as a viable part of our habitat up there, we have to have some control over the population," Howard said.

"Right now, it's an uncontrolled population. It's increased rapidly each year. The hunt will put some brake on the increases," Howard said. "Depending on the kill, it will reduce the number of bear/human impacts that have been taking place recently."

Nina Austenberg, director of the Humane Society's mid-Atlantic regional chapter in Mount Olive, said she wasn't surprised by Tuesday's decision. The Fish and Game Council first proposed the hunt in March, and hunt supporters easily outnumbered opponents at a May 22 public hearing.

"It is grim, but it isn't anything that we didn't expect," Austenberg said. "We have asked our attorneys for anything we might have overlooked."

Schrier, who is a Morris County freeholder, speculated that animal rights activists and some municipalities might seek an injunction to block the hunt. The threat of a lawsuit led former Gov. Christie Whitman to pressure Fish and Game to cancel an approved bear hunt three years ago.

In May, the Passaic County Freeholders expressed their opposition to a hunt. The Morris County Freeholders have not taken a position.

Schrier said several factors could "at least impede the hunt," but he said he doubted that anything would keep it from getting under way.

"We will have a minimum of two days of bear hunting," Schrier said, citing language in the game code that gives Campbell the right to order the hunt ended within 24 hours after reviewing data on the first day's kill total.

When bear hunting in New Jersey ended in 1970, the statewide population had dwindled to about 100, and officials were worried that the species would soon become extinct here.

Efforts to expand the bear population have succeeded, but also have created a problem for some people living in bear country.

While there has never been a fatal black bear attack in New Jersey, a 5-month-old infant was killed in upstate New York last year. In May, a bear swatted a 2-year-old Sparta boy on his head. Three days later, a West Milford man was injured after grappling with a bruin that was fighting with the family dog in his back yard.

"The increasing bear population poses both a public safety and a wildlife management challenge," Campbell said.

Schrier and others who oppose a hunt have said that they doubted a hunt would work. They have called for more education about the need to secure garbage in bear country, along with more aversive conditioning and an experimental bear contraception program.

Scott Bach, a Rockaway Township resident and member of the National Rifle Association's Board of Directors, said he decided to support a hunt after encountering a bruin near his home in 2000.

"They're not as benevolent as (people) think they are," he said of the bears.

The hunt would begin as many bears are hibernating, but Howard said that shouldn't limit the numbers.

"Probably half of the females could be hibernating, but even with that, half of the females will be available," Howard said. Reducing the number of female bears would have the greatest effect on reducing the rate of population growth.

DEP spokesman Jack Kaskey said that Fish and Game Council chairman Scott Ellis abstained from the vote and that Jeannette Vreeland missed Tuesday's meeting.

http://www.dailyrecord.com/news/articles/news1-bearvote.htm