How important is hound hunting in managing bears is it needed to limit the bear population?
The current population objective for bears is to “Stabilize the bear population by 2005 at no less than current (1999) levels, through annual hunting and trapping harvests.” We estimate that the population has increased since 1999, and that an annual harvest of between 3,500 and 4,000 bears is required to reach the population objective. Over the past ten years (1993-2002) the mean percentage of the bear harvest that was derived from hound hunting was 11.6% 0.7% (mean standard error). The highest percentage of the bear harvest attributable to hound hunters was in 1993 when hunters using hounds took 15.4% of the harvest. In general, as the bear harvest has increased the last 10 years, the percentage of bears taken by hunters using hounds has decreased slightly. If the bear harvest from hound hunters was removed from the total bear kill, an average of 3,355 123 bears would have been harvested annually during the period 1999 to 2002. Given this lower harvest figure, the Department would no
