http://trib.com/lifestyles/rec...4d-62bdf38ce615.html


Grizzly bear hunting regulations proposed in Wyoming; rules would allow up to 24 bears to be killed in historic hunt

Christine Peterson 307-797-0731, Christine.Peterson@trib.com Mar 9, 2018


Up to 24 grizzly bears could be killed during this fall’s hunting season if Wyoming’s wildlife commission approves new draft regulations.

It would be the first grizzly bear hunting season since bears were placed on the endangered species list in 1975. Grizzly bear hunting has been long-awaited by those who believe their numbers are large enough and feared by others who say the bears are still at risk of being endangered.

While the most that could be killed by hunters are 24 bears, the specifics of the hunts are more nuanced, said Brian Nesvik, the Wyoming Game and Fish Department’s chief game warden.

Only 12 bears will be allowed to be killed in what is called the demographic monitoring area, a chunk of Wyoming surrounding Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks that is considered suitable grizzly bear habitat. The monitoring area generally occupies the northwest corner of the state including the bulk of the Wind River Range. It also stretches into Montana and Idaho, though the proposed hunting regulations only apply to Wyoming.

Another 12 bears can be killed outside of the area in places that aren’t suitable grizzly bear habitat – such as corn fields on ranches in the plains – or in areas where they consistently cause conflict.

Licenses will be $6,000 for a nonresident and $600 for a resident. Six of the 24 licenses will go to nonresidents.

Wildlife officials estimate there were just over 700 grizzly bears in the greater Yellowstone ecosystem in 2017. There isn’t an estimate for how many bears live outside the monitoring area near places like Lander or Powell.

“It provides for a very conservative hunting season using the quota that is pretty much prescribed by and calculated by a formula in the conservation strategy and tri-state memorandum,” Nesvik said. “It spits out a number and says we can’t take out any more than this number of females and this number of males.”

Within the monitoring area, up to two female and 10 male bears will be allowed to be killed. Licenses will be given on a lottery system, but only two licenses will be initially offered. As hunters kill bears, they will call into the department to report the gender of the bear. If two female bears are the first two killed, for example, the hunt will be over.

The female quota only applies within the monitoring area. The 12 bears allowed to be killed outside the area can be of either gender.

Hunters will also be required to complete an education course specifically about grizzly bear hunting, and will be given a satellite communication device to report their kill from the field. Bears will need to be brought into a Game and Fish office within five days to verify gender and collect other biological samples.

***
Grizzly bear hunting has been a source of great controversy throughout the West for more than a decade as the apex predator made its way on and off of the endangered species list.

After grizzlies were delisted in June, Montana decided not to hold a hunt in 2018. British Columbia chose in December to stop hunting grizzlies altogether.

Environmental groups say bear numbers cannot sustain any kind of hunting in the greater Yellowstone ecosystem because of challenges they face from changing food sources.

“Wyoming must demonstrate it can manage grizzly bears responsibly, not rush to begin a trophy hunt,” the Sierra Club wrote in a January news release. “The state’s jump to allow Greater Yellowstone’s treasured grizzlies to be killed for sport the minute they lose federal protections is irresponsible. The focus needs to be on ensuring sustained grizzly bear recovery and coexistence in the region.”

A hunting season will also depend on the outcome of a couple of legal hurdles. The Northern Cheyenne Tribe, the Sierra Club and The Humane Society sued the Fish and Wildlife Service in late August saying climate change and human conflicts are already putting too much pressure on the charismatic creature.

And in early December, U.S. officials said they were going to review removing protections from grizzlies because of a federal appeals court decision regarding wolves in the Great Lakes. The appeals court said that wildlife officials had not considered the loss of the species’ historical range in their decision to delist.

The Fish and Wildlife Service plans to release its conclusions by March 31.

Nesvik says the estimate is conservative, and that the proposed limit would not decrease the total number of grizzlies, as has been the case with wolf hunting.

Game and Fish is also proposing a hunting ban within a quarter mile of U.S. highways in the monitoring area. The prohibition is meant to prevent hunters from shooting bears visible to the public. It will also not allow hunting in the western portion of the hunt area surrounding Grand Teton National Park to help avoid hunters killing some of the more well-known bears — such as the famous Bear 399 — which draw people from around the world to view.

The Jackson Hole Chamber of Commerce asked for a similar provision in a letter to Game and Fish in August.

“We ask that as your agency experts develop hunt areas, quotas and seasons that they explicitly account for the economic value that bears represent for tourism and businesses in Wyoming,” the letter stated. “This could mean management options that include significantly reduced or no trophy hunting in and around Jackson Hole (and other tourism communities that voice the same concern).”

Hunting will not be allowed in either national park, the John D. Rockefeller Jr. Memorial Parkway or the Wind River Reservation.

***
Game and Fish spent a couple of months holding meetings around the state asking people for their views on grizzly bears. Wildlife managers reported their findings to the Game and Fish Commission in January and the commission directed the department to draft regulations.

Another series of public meetings will be held in March and April to discuss the regulations.

The commission will vote on the proposal on May 23 in Lander. If approved, the season will begin Sept. 1 outside of the monitoring area and Sept. 15 inside of it and close no later than Nov. 15.

they are holding the hunt on the wrong side of the park.
hopefully this does go through and is successful then maybe Idaho can do the same thing on the south-west side of the Park.
there is a lot more habitat on that side and holds far more bears.

We used to belong to Sierra Club, but their anti-hunting rhetoric has caused the checks to stop.

All I know is....I'll be in for the drawing!

I think I'll go to AK & hunt with Jake.

When we had a season, annual kill was about a dozen bears, hard hunt even in a limited entry.

Grizz

quote:

Originally posted by AnotherAZWriter:
We used to belong to Sierra Club, but their anti-hunting rhetoric has caused the checks to stop.

Same here!!!

quote:

Originally posted by Aaron Neilson:
All I know is....I'll be in for the drawing!

Yep. If they allow non-res.

Jeremy

oh they will sell non res licenses.
probably 20-25% will be non res for 10X the amount as a resident tag.

$600 for resident and $6000 for non-resident.

They should have done $100 for resident non-refundable and $600 for non-resident non-refundable, and do it on a call basis like the buffalo hunts used to be.

Wyoming got balls
Montana chickened out

Wyoming learned their lesson on wolves.

About time they started a rationale grizzly bear engagement approach IMO.

BH63

Don't hold your breath guys! The antis will find some friggin Lib Judge that will figure out a reason to delay the hunt!

http://missoulian.com/news/loc...8e-e4e543d39814.html


Federal judge in Missoula speeds up grizzly lawsuit ahead of fall hunting seasons


ROB CHANEY rchaney@missoulian.com Mar 13, 2018 Updated Mar 15, 2018



A federal district judge derailed a docket full of legal preliminaries about removing the grizzly bear from Endangered Species Act protection on Tuesday, in hopes of getting the whole matter decided before Wyoming and Idaho open grizzly hunting seasons this fall.

“I don’t think we always make our best decisions, our best briefs or our best arguments in the context of emergency injunctive relief motions,” U.S. District Judge Dana Christensen said in Missoula. “It’s not efficient to deal with issues of this importance in the context of restraining orders.”

In a ruling from the bench, Christensen denied the federal government’s request to delay proceedings in six lawsuits challenging the delisting of grizzly bears in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. He also rejected requests by three different groups to decide the case based on technicalities. And he ordered all parties to put their sprawling arguments into a single set of briefs for a hearing in August.

Tuesday’s hearing brought together federal lawyers representing the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service against the Northern Cheyenne Tribe, Sierra Club, Center for Biological Diversity, National Parks Conservation Association, Humane Society of the U.S., Wild Earth Guardians and an independent attorney from Chicago. On the sidelines, lawyers from Safari Club International, the National Rifle Association and the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation also sought intervener status in the case.

FWS delisted the roughly 700 grizzlies in and around Yellowstone National Park on July 31, 2017, while leaving protections in place in five other grizzly recovery zones. The next day, a Washington, D.C. appeals court overturned the delisting of gray wolves in the Western Great Lakes Region. That case warned FWS that it couldn’t remove Endangered Species Act protections from one distinct population segment without showing how the decision would affect other protected wolf populations.

Four months later, FWS officials published a request in the Federal Register asking for public comment on whether the Great Lakes wolf decision might affect Greater Yellowstone grizzly delisting. Christensen found that confounding.

“How is this public comment period somehow going to shed any light or give any assistance at all with the issues in this lawsuit?” Christensen asked U.S. Department of Justice Attorney Coby Howell. “When we’re talking about the application of a circuit court opinion, that’s a decision I’m going to have to make. How is public comment going to help me out?”

Howell replied that FWS needed until at least April 30 to analyze the comments and then either add more findings to the existing delisting rule or start the process of withdrawing it. Doing so would ensure the court had a fully prepared agency rule to consider, he said.

But the government’s opponents pounced all over that idea. Earthjustice attorney Katherine O’Brien called the delay request an opportunity “to cook up justifications to prop up a decision they’ve already made.”

“Meanwhile, Wyoming will be turning 24 grizzly bears into rugs and wall hangings,” O’Brien said. Wyoming’s Game and Fish Department has proposed allowing hunters to kill up to 24 grizzlies starting in some areas on Sept. 1. Idaho’s Department of Fish and Wildlife has proposed a fall hunting season for one bear. Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife & Parks officials decided not to hold a 2018 grizzly hunt.

Additionally, the grizzly management rules in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming allow much more leeway for farmers and ranchers to kill grizzlies threatening their livestock than the ESA permitted. That means grizzlies and their advocates could suffer harm every day that the court delays a final decision on whether to put the bears back under ESA protection.

Christensen said he was not pre-judging the case when pointing out that both sides acknowledged the reduced protections grizzlies had under state management. Given that and the lack of justification for the FWS public comment review, he denied the government’s request for a delay. But then he went further.

“There’s only one of me and an army of you,” Christensen said to the roomful of attorneys. Pushing the deadlines closer to a potential hunting season would invite last-minute requests for restraining orders and injunctions.

“I’ll do anything I can to avoid that,” Christensen said. “You’d be writing briefs when you’d rather be with your kids at the end of August. And I’d be getting out emergency orders, opposed to logically and methodically proceeding with the case. I want to proceed in a manner we all agree with, leading to a hearing and ultimately a decision.”