The Wyoming Stock Growers Association is thrilled that grizzly bears have been delisted as an endangered species and fully supports the Wyoming Game and Fish Department’s plan to allow limited, controlled hunts of grizzlies next autumn.
The Cowboy State’s department conducted public hearings last fall and this winter, taking input from hundreds of people about its Wyoming Grizzly Bear Management Plan, which includes research, education, population monitoring, conflict management, and hunting.
A public comment period regarding draft regulations for grizzly hunting proposed by wildlife managers will start in February with at least eight meetings to be scheduled across the state. Hunting areas, season lengths, and how licenses will be issued are among specifics that will be addressed.
A predetermined formula that cannot be changed by states sets the maximum number of bears that can be killed in a hunting season. Allowing grizzly hunting to occur is the most controversial aspect of Wyoming’s management plan.
Idaho and Montana, which also are part of the Greater Yellowstone region, may allow grizzly hunting, too. Until last June, grizzlies spent more than four decades on the endangered species list, but their population in the Yellowstone area has grown from about 140 in 1974 to more than 700 bears now.
Several environmental and tribal groups have sued the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service over delisting grizzly bears, contending conflicts with humans and climate change adversely impacting food sources pose too many challenges for the bears to survive and hunting to be sustained.
Wildlife managers say the grizzly population has stabilized in the Yellowstone area, and the bears have run out of room to expand.
Jim Magagna, the Wyoming Stock Growers Association’s executive vice president, told the Western Livestock Journal that five lawsuits filed by radical environmentalists and tribes have been combined into one suit, and a court decision is expected to be rendered in Washington D.C.
“We’re watching to see what happens. So far there is no schedule on the various lawsuits. We’re prepared to file a friend of the court brief,” Magagna said, noting many more legal battles are waged in the judicial system than when he started with the stock growers’ association 19 years ago. “That’s how litigious our society has become.”
The Wyoming Game and Fish Department is in a good position to issue grizzly hunting permits later this year for either one designated area or several, he said, stressing that grizzly depredation of livestock herds in the northwestern part of the state has become severe.
Thorough records in the Upper Green River Grazing Allotment have been kept. Before grizzlies and wolves were introduced there, annual livestock herd losses totaled 3 percent. After wolves arrived, that loss ratio climbed to 5-7 percent. Now that grizzlies have been added to the mix, that has spiked to 13 percent.
“Actually, losses to wolves have diminished,” Magagna said, noting predators have had a significant impact on elk and deer herds, too. “Hunting groups are just about as concerned as we livestock producers are.”
Hunting groups also have joined lawsuits against environmental and tribal organizations seeking to relist grizzlies as endangered, in addition to joining other court battles in alliance with stock growers.
With the Trump administration taking office, there has been a much higher level of activity in regard to natural resources and virtually all federal agencies have been making changes, Magagna said, mentioning his days lately have been packed with meetings and conference calls. “It’s wonderful, but it’s almost overwhelming.”
Wyoming has a very generous compensation program for livestock ranchers based on market values when calves, cows or sheep are confirmed to be killed by grizzlies or wolves.
If Wyoming pursues a grizzly hunting season as planned, the number of bears permitted to be killed would depend on their 2017 population and mortalities. Based on roughly 700 bears in the Greater Yellowstone area as determined by wildlife biologists in 2016, 48 adult males and 19 adult females could die from any cause, including vehicle accidents, fights with other bears, disease, old age, or removals due to conflicts with people.
In 2016, 37 male bears and 12 female bears died. Based on a formula, that would leave a total of 18 possible bears in Wyoming, Idaho, and Montana to be killed during a hypothetical 2017 hunting season, according to the Wyoming Game and Fish Department. The state’s game and fish commission is set to consider final proposed hunting regulations at its May 23 meeting in Lander. — Mark Mendiola, WLJ correspondent
