Will bear hunting in Florida be a reality in the future?
At the December 2024 Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) commission meeting the Fish and Wildlife Research Institute (FWRI) staff gave an update on black bear management in Florida. After concluding that the bear population continues to grow and expand its range steadily, we convinced the commission to entertain the idea of reinstating a bear hunt quota in Florida. A bear hunt has not occurred since 2015, after anti-conservation groups sued the state over the hunt and got it shut down. These same groups are now doing their best to squash this hunt yet again.
We ask you to TAKE ACTION and urge the FWC to support the return of a Florida bear hunt.
Management History
Prior to the rapid urban development at the expense of Florida’s natural ecosystems, Black Bears were ubiquitous across the landscape, with some estimates as high as 11,000 bears in Florida. In the 1900s, bears we considered a pest and were killed and extirpated down to approximately 500 bears remaining in Florida. In the 1970s, bears were listed as a State-designated threatened species, triggering efforts to manage bears for recovery. By 2002 bears had recovered to 2,500 bears, by 2015 there were more than 4,000 bears. A new stock assessment is expected to be published in 2029.
After the 2002 stock assessment, bear-human conflicts were on the rise. Bears were becoming a nuisance in some areas, and vehicle collisions were becoming more common. FWC recognized the need for bears to be managed to reduce these conflicts. By 2011, bears had made such a strong recovery that they were delisted from the threatened species list. By 2015, bear-human conflicts were so high, and the population steady, that FWC deemed it appropriate to instate a limited quota bear hunt (quota set to 320 bears). Harvested bears would need to be checked in the day they were harvested, and the hunt would be closed when the quota was reached, or it was expected to be exceed in the following day. This strategy was modelled after other states that have sustainable bear hunts, and an 8-week season was established based on average harvest success rates in those states. Upon the start of the Florida Bear Hunt, we quickly learned that there may be many more bears than our stock assessments were accounting for as 295 bears were harvest in just the first day. The commission closed the hunt so as not to exceed the allotted quota.
Despite the successful execution of the hunt without exceeding the quota, and the indication that population numbers may be much higher than expected, public emotional outcries cited the uncertainty of bear population numbers to have the hunt closed for future years so that more information could be gathered.
Future of Bear Management in Florida
Now, 9 years later, FWC staff gave a recent update on the Bear management plan, major points are summarized below (full presentation available here).
- 7 bear management units (BMU) have been established to allow for region specific management of 7 genetically distinct subpopulations
- Bear Range has expanded in each unit from 17% to 51%
- Populations on 4 BMUs are thriving and have grown to 2.5 to 5 times above the minimum population objectives. Minimum population objectives are the minimum population need to maintain long-term genetic health of the population.
- Florida currently has more than 17,000 square miles of suitable bear habitat, of which 46% is protected. This is adequate habitat for current and the larger predicted future populations
- State-wide bear-related calls are at an all time high, with a 42% increase from 2016, indicating a substantial population increase. These calls include both positive (bear sightings) and negative (complaints), the proportion of which has remained relatively consistent through the years (average 40% of calls are complaints).
- $2.1 million was provided to local governments to provide bear proofing for trashcans. This bear proofing has decreased bear-human conflicts on a local scale, and should be expanded to larger scales. However, complaint calls make up the same percentage of the increasing numbers of calls, indicating that securing trash is not sufficient to manage all bear-human conflicts.
- Future bear management efforts should be directed at reducing the number of vehicle collisions, bear-human conflicts, and improving habitat corridors for improved population connectivity
Reasons to support a bear hunt in Florida:
- The available data indicates that bear populations are steadily increasing. Populations were already above targeted population objectives during the 2015 hunt, and their numbers are even higher now.
- In the 4 BMUs where bear densities are particularly high, bear-human conflicts have become a huge problem. Bear-human conflicts often lead to the death of bears through vehicle collisions or euthanization of nuisance bears. A limited and highly regulated localized bear hunt quota could help reduce bear densities in areas where bear-human conflicts have become a problem, and leave low density subpopulations alone to continue their recovery.
- Bears that are hit by cars and left to rot or nuisance bears that are euthanized are wasted, whereas harvested bears will go to feeding fellow Floridians.
- While staff and state resources are depleted to clean up vehicle collisions, transport or euthanize nuisance bears, a bear hunt could generate funding through license and tag sales that could be allocated toward future management objectives such as expanding on the bear-proof trashcan initiative, habitat restoration, and appropriate habitat corridors.
FAQ:
- Will harvesting bears in one BMU negatively impact their positive population growth and range expansion in another BMU? No, it will not. Bear populations and ranges are largely driven by food and habitat availability and habitat connectivity. FWC studies have shown that there is more than enough available habitat and food for current and future bear populations in Florida. However, the 7 BMUs were created based on genetically distinct subpopulations. The reason for this is because there is limited or no connectivity between the available habitats in each of the BMUs, this means that bears in densely populated BMUs will not “spill over” to populate sparsely populated BMUs. Furthermore, bear dispersal is not driven by density so long as there is enough food to go around, and since food is not the limiting factor in bear populations, removing some bears from a densely populated area will not prevent other bears in that area from leaving since they never had a good reason to leave in the first place.
- Why would some want to harvest a bear? Are they even good to eat? Despite popular believe, bears provide excellent table fair. Much like pork, bear meat must be heated to a minimum temperature to prevent potential transfer of parasites. Bear meat is rich in flavor, that is often described as somewhere between pork and venison, with a sweet hint depending on what they have been feeding on. Fall harvested bears are the best as the have greater fat stores often derived from a berry rich diet, leading to sweet flavors. This fat can be rendered to oil and used for frying and sweet baking recipes.
- During the last bear hunt, we came dangerously close to exceeding the quota, how can we prevent that from happening in the future? FWC recognizes that the previous bear hunt quota system was flawed, and they are dedicated to finding another system for any future bear hunts. It is likely that they will adopt a system similar to the alligator tag system in which separate sub populations are assessed to identify a conservative number of bears that can be harvested without negatively impacting the remaining populations. Tags will be made available for those units, and hunters can apply for tags, indicating their order of preference for the different units. With this system, the number of allotted tags is decided before the hunt, so there is no way for too many tags to be filled.
- Florida’s wildlife is already facing hardships due to habitat loss and urban sprawl, should we be worried that added hunting pressure will be too much for our bear population? Black bears are the most adaptable big game animal in the world. Despite increasing urban sprawl and development across all of its range, black bear populations continue to thrive. So much so, that the North American population of black bear is twice as big as all other bear species combined across the world. It owes its success to its ability to adapt and find food in a variety of landscapes, include suburban landscapes. While development in Florida certainly has impacts on bears, this impact is minimal compared to other types of wildlife, and thus the addition of a limited bear hunt will not be overly taxing to the current bear population.
- Florida doesn’t have many hunters, can hunting really generate enough funding to impact conservation efforts? In 2023, hunting license and tag sales as well as federal contributions through the Pitman-Robertson fund contributed $29 million to FWC’s budget, making up 28.5% of the total budget for the year. The Pitman-Robertson fund is derived of a voluntary 11% excise tax applied to guns and ammo across the nation. The collected funds are apportioned to different states based on the number of hunting license sold each year. These funds, as well as the funds generated directly from license and tag sales are restricted to spending on specific objectives such as habitat restoration, conservation, and access to public lands.
Additional Resources
- The Scientific Outdoorsmen Podcast - Episode 5: Is Florida Ready for a Black Bear Hunt?
- Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission: Update on Implementation of the Florida Black Bear Management Plan. December 2024.