Closin Time
UKC Forum Member
Registered: Sep 2006
Location: central PA
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maybe some helpfull info (this is from plott dogs web site)
DNR says bear population in West Virginia is about ideal
Mannix Porterfield
Register-Herald Reporter
August 12, 2009 09:21 pm
— CHARLESTON — Close to 10,000 bears prowl across West Virginia, and the Division of Natural Resources feels that’s about where the population of the state’s official animal should be.
Keeping abreast of them, the DNR has installed global positioning units on 23 selected bears to check their movements in protected areas, lawmakers were told Tuesday.
“We don’t have to go out there and track them all the time,” said Chris Ryan, supervisor of the DNR’s Wildlife Resources Section.
“That’s what is so neat. It records it.”
Bear hunting is a $51.8 million industry in the state, Ryan said, and population shifts within the regions dictate how seasons are altered across West Virginia.
Hunters spend $4 million in equipment, $7 million during the harvest season (while non-residents spend $1.3 million), another $20 million on veterinarian bills and dog food, and some $18.4 million while training dogs, Ryan told the Parks, Recreation and Natural Resources Subcommittee.
In the southern coalfields, a region thick with bears, Ryan said the animals take refuge in coal mine sites. This is especially true in Kanawha, Boone, Fayette and Raleigh counties.
“Do they like polluted water?” inquired a panelist, Delegate Danny Wells, D-Kanawha.
Actually, Ryan explained, the bears are in a zone of protection since mine installations are off-limits to hunters, given the millions of dollars invested in coal equipment.
What’s more, he said, the bears feel a sense of safety from the isolation afforded by hanging out in coal mine sites.
“They’re pretty smart,” he said.
Delegate Jeff Eldridge, D-Lincoln, a co-chairman of the panel, suggested the bears prefer the mine sites for an additional reason — the ability to feast on an abundance of wild berries.
“They wear them out,” he said.
Ryan said the current bear population is preferable, depending on which region of the state is in mind.
“Some of our counties have management objectives to stabilize the population,” he said.
“Some have them to increase population. It depends on where you are. From a statewide perspective, it’s about the (desired) number. We would want about what we have now.”
Last year, the DNR recorded 1,142 nuisance complaints by the public about bears on their property.
Answering a question by Delegate Clif Moore, D-McDowell, he said the DNR considers each bear kill on private property individually.
“That would come down to the officer’s judgment,” he said.
“Was the bear shot in the field or was it on someone’s porch?”
Moore wondered about the safety aspects of so many hunters fanning out to hunt both deer and bear.
Another panelist, Sen. Ed Bowman, D-Hancock, said the No. 1 risk appears to be hunters tumbling out of tree stands rather than posing a threat to one another.
Ryan said the DNR considers heart attacks to be the most common hazard hunters face, not the firearms they use.
“We haven’t had a real problem,” he said.
“I guess that’s a tribute to our safety program.”
— E-mail:
mannix@register-herald.com
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06-24-2009 10:39 PM
