Update on Bear Hunt and the BTBF position
Our concerns are for the welfare of the bear population, the future of bear hunts for the sportsmen and women, as well as the impact this decision will have other states in the future.
Just last week the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation has wisely decided to protect the population of bears by not allowing the hunting of Mothers with cubs alongside or cubs. Unfortunately they have yet to define “cub”. A cub should be defined was a bear weighing less than 75 pounds.
Cubs will only weigh between 40 and 70 lbs by October, so a cub can be easily recognized by size and most easily recognized if it is at the side of its mother.
Since The ODWC has clarified their stance on hunting Mothers with cub along side and cubs the only other issues that are disconcerting are baiting and the quota system.
Baiting is being allowed on private lands. Most hunting is done on private land, which essentially make baiting legal in the state. It would be in the interest of conservation to remove the feeding stations ten days before the season begins. Most likely the bears using this station will return and the hunter may find a trophy animal.
A quota system is being proposed with the limit of bears to be taken from the population to be at 20. It would be in the best interest of the hunters, the state and the bear population if instead the state implemented a lottery system. This would prevent anxious hunters shooting the first bear they see, in order to get in before the quota is exceeded. In this way a trophy may be more easily gained by the selected hunters.
It would also generate additional revenue for the department to continue its bear research by the Wildlife Research Unit at OSU and insure the bear population will continue, which will insure bear hunting seasons for our sportsmen and women in future years.
Implementing a lottery of 100 licenses, keeping the quota at 20 bears, will prevent a repeat of hunting disasters like the ones in New Jersey, where in 1970 the black bear population was virtually wiped out by allowing a quota hunt of only 20 bears that netted nearly 600 bears in a matter of 2 days, in which then governor, William T. Cahill, had to step in and declared a emergency stay on hunting bear.
In 2003 New Jersey held its first black bear hunt in over 30 years a total of 328 bears where shot during a one week season. Again in 2005, a total of 301 bears were claimed in the last legal 1 week bear hunting season.
If the same results happen in Oklahoma the black bear population will be annihilated, again.
Bears are indigenous to Oklahoma but were extirpated by 1934. As late as 1968 the population of bears in Oklahoma was 0.
Currently there are between 450 and 500 Black Bears in the entire state of Oklahoma, (not just the southeast as reported by Alan Peoples, although most of the population is found in this area). This is less than the initial seed population used by Arkansas to return bears to their ecology, at a great expense to their state. They populated the Kiamichi and Ozarks Mountains with 514 bears that were caught in Minnesota over the course of ten years, beginning in 1958. After forty years, they now have a population of around 3000 bears and now allow the hunting of bear through a lottery system.
The lottery system for bear hunting licenses used by Arkansas provides both hunting opportunities for the sportsmen and women, and a great source of revenue for the Arkansas Fish and Game department as well as protects the future population of the black bear.
Summary
With Black bears being indigenous to the region, but extirpated by 1934 and the population had not recovered as of1968 (44 years later), the realization of a lost bear population is very profound. It was over 10 years after the State of Arkansas reintroduced the black bear back into its ecology, with a seed population of 514 bears released into the Ozark and Kiamichi Mountains, before we found a population of bears in the state of Oklahoma. It is obvious by all information gathered from other states such as New Jersey and Arkansas, as well as Oklahoma’s own findings that the bear population doesn’t rebound well. In order to protect the future of bear hunting seasons in Oklahoma, protection of the future of bear population must be at the forethought of the decision by the Oklahoma Legislation.
The Legislation can hope to accomplish this by protecting the female and cub population, by defining a cub as one that weights less than 75 pounds, by having the gender and weight of the kill recorded, and by implementing a lottery for licensure and a limit of only 20 bears taken from the population.