What is bear hounding?
Bear hounding is the practice of using packs of radio-collared dogs to pursue a bear until the exhausted, frightened animal climbs a tree, where they are shot, or turn to fight the hounds. Dogs are often injured or even killed.
What is bear baiting?
Trophy hunters and hunting guides dump food in the woods to lure black bears in for an easy kill, in an unsporting and unethical practice called “baiting.” Bait piles are typically composed of foods unhealthy to bears, including fatty pastries rich in processed sugars, grease, or even toxins from Theobromines such as caffeine found in chocolate. Both New Hampshire and Michigan have banned chocolate and other toxins for use in bear bait. Spoiled baits are also noxious, and toxic baits are fatal to bears, pets and other wildlife. Baiting bears with human foods increases bears’ aging at the cellular level, and leads to tooth decay. Bait sites lead to mortalities to smaller bears, because it concentrates bears who compete for bait. Also bait sites concentrate several species which can lead to the spread of diseases like rabies and mange, or mortalities to small-bodied prey animals.
What is springtime bear hunting?
Some states allow black bear trophy hunts during the spring, after bears emerge from hibernation. Bears are easy targets for trophy hunters because they’re lethargic from months of sleep. Bears are in poor body condition after spending the whole winter without food – especially mother bears, who by spring have given birth and nursed their cubs relying solely upon their fat reserves. Black bear cubs, usually born between December and February, emerge from hibernation with their mothers in April and May—emergence is entirely weather dependent. Mother bears care for and protect their cubs until they are 17 to 24 months old. Black bear families break up typically between May and July of the cubs’ second year.
Spring hunts can kill mother bears, leaving orphaned cubs to fend for themselves. Some cubs are only a few months old and still nursing or are yearlings who are still dependent for another few months. Most orphaned cubs suffer from starvation, predation or exposure.
