Activists take on black bear hunting

BALTIMORE (Map, News) - Animal activists criticized black bear hunting in Maryland, which kicked off for a third season Monday after a previous 50-year ban, as an inhumane sport supported by Gov. Robert Ehrlich.

“Bob Ehrlich is an enemy of animal welfare and is simply out of step with Maryland’s humane values,” said Michael Markarian, president of the Humane Society Legislative Fund, which lobbies for animal-protection laws.

The organization launched TV advertisements Monday to run in Baltimore and Washington, that attack the hunts, which allow hunters chosen through a lottery to kill up to 55 bears in Western Maryland.

Markarian said of the 40 bears that were killed last year, only six were identified by the Department of Natural Resources as nuisances to humans for wandering into residents’ lawns to taste bird feeders and dig into garbage.

“There’s no purpose for shooting them,” said Markarian, whose group recommends pepper sprays and bear-proof trash cans instead.

Ehrlich’s press office forwarded questions to DNR, which defended the hunt.

Getting rid of nuisance bears is only one goal of the hunts, which were only reinstated after public education about putting garbage and pet food away failed to reduce the number of human-bear interactions, said DNR Assistant Secretary Michael Slattery.

“Bears, without regulated hunting, become accustomed to human presence, grow bolder and bolder, so we have to [hunt] to slow the rate of population growth,” he said. “We love having bears, we don’t want to reverse [their numbers], we just want to slow the rate of growth.”

Bear hunting was banned in Maryland in 1953, when the population dwindled to 12. In 1972, they were considered an endangered species, but their numbers have grown to between 326 and 500, according to legislative fund and DNR estimates.

Slattery estimated that the state’s bear population would grow by 300 cubs a year without the hunts, which resumed in 2004.

He criticized bear hunt detractors for “trusting us before with resource management and now all of a sudden ... we don’t know what we are doing.”

The first session of bear hunting in Allegany, Garrett and Washington counties runs until Saturday and will resume Dec. 4-9.

kvolkmann@baltimoreexaminer.com