Wildlife groups condemn approval of ‘barbaric’ Florida black bear hunt | Florida

Wildlife groups condemned a decision by Florida regulators to allow the hunting for black bears for the first time in a decade and to allow “barbaric” practices, including the use of bait traps, archery and dog packs.

Wednesday, the unanimous vote of Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission Commission (FWC) to approve a limited hunting season in December followed a presentation of the insistent staff on the fact that a growing bear population and increasing meetings with humans justified a reduction in the number.

In May, officials investigated what was considered the first deadly mutilla of a person by a black bear in the state.

But many demonstrators who spoke during the FWC meeting in Havana said that the decision had made the stopwatch retreat during decades of recovery of the formerly threatened species.

They criticized hunting as a “cruelty to legalized animals”, and declared that the commissioners used defective science to justify its approval, including estimates in the number of bear instead of a formal census which will not be complete for five years.

“This poorly conceived bear hunt will endanger an animal already threatened and will open the door to the destruction of the habitat of critical nature throughout Florida,” said Susannah Randolph, director of the Sierra Club section at the Panel.

“Is our future one of the photos of trophies of trophies standing on dead animals in large concrete car parks? [Florida governor] Ron Desantis could stop this hunt at the moment and leave a lasting heritage for our children and grandchildren. »»

More than 160 members of the public spoke at the very accused meeting which, in fact, the rules spread in rubber temporarily approved the commissioners in May. FWC will issue permits for the slaughter of 187 bears, or almost 5% of the estimated total of Florida by 4,000, on a 23-day hunt from December 6 in four sub-populations where the figures are considered healthy.

Several speakers have declared that hunting methods that will be authorized – including arcs and arrows, attracted bears with food traps and the establishment of dogs formed on their prey from 2027 – deserved the statement of the State that it was a conservation measure.

The use of dogs is authorized in only 17 of the 32 states which allow hunting for bears.

“It’s just slaughter and torture,” said Adam Sugalski, founder of the Wildlife Advocacy Group Bear Defenders.

“The use of dogs is cruelty to legalized animals. Dogs will be gradually among the next few years after their training, which means during the dead, you can simply pass your dogs to the woods and chase bears just for fun and kill them. ”

Others underlined the 2015 debacle of the last Florida hunt, which was interrupted prematurely when 300 bears were killed in 48 hours, and the hunters, including an FWC commissioner who had voted to approve him, were accused of having illegally killed pregnant bears, new mothers and cubs.

Steve Meyers, a lawyer who worked on a trial to try to prevent this hunt, noted on Wednesday that the seven current FWC commissioners were appointed or reconfirmed by Desantis.

“The imagery of a bear hunt for Ron Desantis will not be a harvest, it will be the lifeless bodies of black bear hanging upside down with blood flowing from their mouth,” he said.

“The media do not need photos of this hunt. Those of the last hunt will be very good. The face of Ron Desantis will be married to this imagery.”

George Warthen, the director of hunting and management of the FWC game, conceded that the public’s response to the May vote was “significant and divided”, and seemed to suggest that hunting was more a preventive decision than a response to any existing problem.

“A highly regulated hunt would prevent future negative impacts of overcrowding,” he said. “Hunting in food stations and with dogs would offer hunters the possibility of selectively harvesting the greatest male bears and avoiding harvesting females, or females with young bear.”

The decision is the last of a series of developments that fauna defenders consider to be detrimental to a population of black bear in a slowly as weak as a few hundred in the 1970s. They include Desantis which disconnects last year a measure allowing residents to kill without fear of repercussions all bear perceived as threat to their families, their pets.

Environmentalists have attempted to raise awareness of the challenges faced by black bears in Florida, in particular the deaths due to vehicle strikes and the loss of habitat by development.

Carlton Ward Jr, an environmentalist who helped found the Florida fauna corridor in 2010 to allow the free movement of vulnerable animals, said that black bears were still fragmented in Florida through seven subpopulations, some of which had not recovered as well as others.

The documentary by Ward Florida Bear Tracks, produced by his company Nature Storytelling Wildpath for the National Geographic Society, recounts the problems of the habitat by following an entirely female team of FWC workers trapping and marking bears in southern Florida.

“We appreciate all the attention of the public that the black bears of Florida obtain and we will bypass this hunt for controversial bears, and we also recognize that the biggest story of who are the black bears of Florida, and where they live, is likely to be excluded from this conversation,” he said.

“There are only about 4,000 bears in the state and 23 million people. The bears are therefore confronted with many challenges with the loss and fragmentation of habitat. As Florida grows, we must learn to coexist with wildlife. It is not optional. It’s essential. “

Ward said that the healthy populations of black bear in certain habitats are not an indication that the species has recovered in the state.

“The bears do not thrive wherever they need. We actually need more bear in Florida, in more places, to have the declared objective of a population of genetically connected state scale,” he said.