This December, a handful of Louisiana hunters could have the chance to take part in a black bear hunt of their residence state for the primary time in a long time. The final time Louisiana held a black bear hunt was in 1987.
The upcoming 2024 black bear hunt was formally licensed on Tuesday at a Louisiana Fish and Wildlife Fee assembly, throughout which the LFWC adopted a Discover of Intent that defines the rules across the hunt, together with dates, areas, bag limits, and authorized strategies of take. The Discover additionally establishes a lottery system to allocate the ten accessible black bear tags to resident hunters.
Tuesday’s choice was to be anticipated, for the reason that identical group of wildlife commissioners voted unanimously to ascertain the searching season in November 2023. Their newer choice was greater than only a formality, since final November’s vote ignited an issue that might have derailed these prospects. On Dec. 31, a coalition of animal rights teams launched a petition to dam the proposed hunt. The petition, which has garnered greater than 31,000 signatures since then, asserts that black bears are a state image and claims their inhabitants isn’t giant sufficient to maintain a regulated hunt.
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Officers with the Louisiana Division of Wildlife and Fisheries disagree, and so they’ve supported the concept of bringing again a black bear hunt. LDWF giant carnivore supervisor John Hanks estimates the statewide inhabitants is not less than 1,200 bears, and final fall he advised commissioners this was ample to have a “conservative harvest in restricted areas,” in line with the Shreveport Occasions.
Most of those bears reside within the northeastern nook of the state — the identical area the place the 2024 hunt will happen — and state lawmakers there have additionally pushed for regulated searching as a approach to handle the state’s rising bear inhabitants. They level out that the species has bounced again in a giant method since 1992, when Lousiana black bears (a definite subspecies of black bear and the official state mammal) had been added to the Endangered Species Checklist. This was 4 years after the state banned bear searching altogether.
By 2016, the species was formally deemed recovered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and federal protections had been dissolved. State wildlife biologists have continued to watch their populations since then, and so they say a fastidiously managed searching season could have little impression on Louisiana’s black bears.
Underneath the rules adopted Tuesday, the 2024 black bear hunt will run from Dec. 7 by means of Dec. 22. All searching might be confined to the far northeastern nook of the state, the place LDWF has established a bear administration space comprising 4 parishes and parts of three extra parishes.
LDWF will allocate 10 black bear tags to licensed resident hunters by means of a lottery system. Profitable candidates might be required to attend a bear hunter coaching course previous to searching, and the harvest of cubs (outlined as any bear underneath 75 kilos) and females with cubs is prohibited. The draw will happen within the fall.
