Attack on Bear Hunting in Washington. Your hunt is next.

Sorry, I should have been more clear on my last post. So far it looks like those close to the matter (those of us who keep pestering commissioners) believe that the rulemaking might be re-reviewed in January. This would be counter to what has been previously said publicly as to the rulemaking process for the spring 2022 hunt (based on the rules of procedure that the commitee follows the no votes would have to bring the issue back up, with Fred Koontz gone, perhaps that changes a bit). That said, you can try to leave a comment requesting a second look here.

https://wdfw.wa.gov/about/commission/contact

Reminder: Be respectful. We need to both drown out the voices of dissent AND be more polite and informed than them. We actually live with these animals, so that should not be hard.

If you want to see what the initial public comment period looked like...it's here. Just take your blood pressure meds before you read it.

https://wdfw.wa.gov/sites/default/f...k_bear_2022_season_emailed_comments_only.xlsx
 
In looking at that data I did notice something rather important.

1211 of the 1862 comments started with the exact same phrase

"Dear Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife,

Washington prides itself on its beautiful outdoors and wild creatures, and the"

Several others are reworded versions of the same thing. Here is one such version:

"Dear Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife,

I am writing to urge you to ban the spring black bear hunt.

Washington prides itself on its beautiful outdoors and wild creatures, and the state’s wildlife management should reflect these values.
The hunt is inhumane, putting bears who have just emerged from hibernation under incredible stress and orphaning bear cubs.
Stopping the spring hunt won’t inconvenience hunters, who have opportunities to take bears in fall. And, as the department’s staff have acknowledged, the hunt has no impact on protecting timber stands — often cited as the reason for the hunt.

Decisions about our state’s wildlife should be made based on the best available science, and management and should reflect the will of most Washington residents. The spring bear hunt fails to meet either of those criteria. It’s a cruel trophy hunt that tears apart bear families and causes unnecessary death and suffering.

For the sake of wildlife and wild places, please stop this hunt now.
Thank you for reading this letter."

The phrase "Washington prides itself on its beautiful outdoors and wild creatures, and the state’s wildlife management should reflect these values. " appears 1266 times in the data. Not surprising given that both PETA and the Humane Society had form letter links to the commissioner site.

The word "trophy" was found in 1355 of the 1862 comments. This was a well funded and well orchestrated smeer campaign against ever single bear hunter in the state. It's provably wrong (we are legally required to take the meat) and has caused us actual harm. I can't help but be curious as to the legitimacy of a case for defamation of character in this instance. From the looks of this whole mess a lot of this started with a few Seattle residents who pursued legal action to stop the hunt, and it snowballed from there. Is fighting fire with fire appropriate?
 
RG_Adult_Onset_Hunter said:
In looking at that data I did notice something rather important.

1211 of the 1862 comments started with the exact same phrase

"Dear Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife,

Washington prides itself on its beautiful outdoors and wild creatures, and the"

Several others are reworded versions of the same thing. Here is one such version:

"Dear Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife,

I am writing to urge you to ban the spring black bear hunt.

Washington prides itself on its beautiful outdoors and wild creatures, and the state’s wildlife management should reflect these values.
The hunt is inhumane, putting bears who have just emerged from hibernation under incredible stress and orphaning bear cubs.
Stopping the spring hunt won’t inconvenience hunters, who have opportunities to take bears in fall. And, as the department’s staff have acknowledged, the hunt has no impact on protecting timber stands — often cited as the reason for the hunt.

Decisions about our state’s wildlife should be made based on the best available science, and management and should reflect the will of most Washington residents. The spring bear hunt fails to meet either of those criteria. It’s a cruel trophy hunt that tears apart bear families and causes unnecessary death and suffering.

For the sake of wildlife and wild places, please stop this hunt now.
Thank you for reading this letter."

The phrase "Washington prides itself on its beautiful outdoors and wild creatures, and the state’s wildlife management should reflect these values. " appears 1266 times in the data. Not surprising given that both PETA and the Humane Society had form letter links to the commissioner site.

The word "trophy" was found in 1355 of the 1862 comments. This was a well funded and well orchestrated smeer campaign against ever single bear hunter in the state. It's provably wrong (we are legally required to take the meat) and has caused us actual harm. I can't help but be curious as to the legitimacy of a case for defamation of character in this instance. From the looks of this whole mess a lot of this started with a few Seattle residents who pursued legal action to stop the hunt, and it snowballed from there. Is fighting fire with fire appropriate?
Click to expand...
I believe your governor is heavily lobbied by the above groups who have lobbied the commission. Perhaps this explains his lack of appointments to the eastern side and appointment of an individual who seems to have cast a vote based on emotion instead wildlife management. Disappointing when politics determines the outcome of a season and little consideration is taken from a management prospective or care where the conservation dollars come from.
 
Keep in mind, that was the initial comment period notes, what is not shown in this data is the hunter comments when the rule was proposed. I might reach out to grab this data in an attempt to clear things up. For those of us who want to pursue the fiscal angle I received this response from WDFW records. I feel like the numbers here would be more compelling if bear tags cost more (things that are valuable are harder to take away).

"Hello Mr. Garrett:

My name is Peter Vernie. I am the Licensing Division Manager for the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. First, let me say your email to the Commission was very well written. I [have] been asking the same question when it comes to revenue loss the agency can expect to see with not having a 2022 Spring Bear hunt,. My conclusion is it’s a little complicated. Last year we only sold 96 bear only licenses to youth, non-residents, disabled, and resident hunters totaling only $2,896 dollars. I know we sold 9,671 spring bear applications for the 2021 spring bear hunt which generated $57,985.00 dollars. That means most if not all of the hunters who purchased a Spring Bear application bought some type of combination license like the Big Four (Deer, Elk, Bear & Cougar) with small game or our Get Outdoors package. All those funds go directly to the agency in our Wildlife account.

The piece I am struggling to understand is how much we might lose in license sales for license year 2022? As you see above we have very few people who only purchase a bear licenses each year. Our most popular license is the Big Four (Deer, Elk, Bear & Cougar) with small game with over 47% of hunters purchasing this license. Over the past two years we seen a big increase in hunter buying our Get Outdoor package because of the value it offers. With the Get Outdoors package you get the Bear and Cougar licenses for almost free when you look at the discounts offered in that package. Hunters who purchase either license will still have an opportunity to hunt bear in the fall. What I don’t know is will they continue to purchase those licenses because of the value they offer or will hunters change their purchasing habits to say just Deer & Elk combo license? Based on what seen in the past hunters will continue to purchase one of our packages and hunt bear in the fall.

At this time the best answer to your question is we generated over $60,000 dollars last year just for Spring Bear hunt applications and Bear only licenses and tags. I suspect the agency revenue loss be higher once we see the actual numbers from our 2022 license sales, which will not be completed in March 31, 2023, but again just not sure how much higher. Hope that answers at least one of your questions.

Thank you:

Peter Vernie
Licensing Division Manager
Department of Fish and Wildlife"

If I take these numbers a bit further that works out to $60,881 in revenue generated by the spring bear hunt. As it looks like we harvested 114 bears last year, that works out to $534 per bear. I would like to see that number be significantly higher, but it is still a decent talking point when it comes to the spring hunt.
 
This is one reason why I plan on hunting bear in Idaho this year with a reduced bear tag. Legislation made by politicians on the west side of Washington with absolutely no real life experience of conservation, and how hunting plays an essential role in such.
 
I actually joined instagram in order to reach more people on the subject (and I have avoided that like the plague).

Here is a post by Douglas Boze (not me) in regards to the anti hunting movement to fill the vacant seats on the WDFW special commision with anti hunters. THAT affects more that bear hunters. That effects ever Washington State Hunt, and since this year game rules are being reworked for the next 4 years we have got to fix this now or pay dearly.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CYNxsk1rk4-/

As I have said over and over, call Jay Inslee's office. Every damn day if you have to.
 
OK looks like we have some great news here.

The special commission is voting on the BHA proposed rule change on the 21st of January. This would reverse the earlier decision on the spring bear hunt. We need as many hunters as possible to show up for the meeting on the 13th to comment in support of this rule change.

Here is the link to the commission meeting pre-registration page.

wdfw.wa.gov

Fish and Wildlife Commission public testimony registration form

wdfw.wa.gov wdfw.wa.gov

You would be commenting on items 1 and 9. Comments are limited to 3 minutes (about one page of material) so write your speeches and trim accordingly. The BHA proposal focuses heavily on the fact that there was a gross lack of public notice when it came to the cancelation of this hunt, so please mention that in your comments. If anyone wants help writing material, I will be happy to help...I trimmed a lot.
 
RG_Adult_Onset_Hunter said:
OK looks like we have some great news here.

The special commission is voting on the BHA proposed rule change on the 21st of January. This would reverse the earlier decision on the spring bear hunt. We need as many hunters as possible to show up for the meeting on the 13th to comment in support of this rule change.

Here is the link to the commission meeting pre-registration page.

wdfw.wa.gov

Fish and Wildlife Commission public testimony registration form

wdfw.wa.gov wdfw.wa.gov

You would be commenting on items 1 and 9. Comments are limited to 3 minutes (about one page of material) so write your speeches and trim accordingly. The BHA proposal focuses heavily on the fact that there was a gross lack of public notice when it came to the cancelation of this hunt, so please mention that in your comments. If anyone wants help writing material, I will be happy to help...I trimmed a lot.
Click to expand...
What section on the 13th is critical for hunters to show up for? The agenda says they're be discussing the spring bear hunt until the 21st.
 
neffa3 said:
What section on the 13th is critical for hunters to show up for? The agenda says they're be discussing the spring bear hunt until the 21st.
Click to expand...
A correction I should make, the 14th is the public comment day (with the 13th being the general discussions that we can view). No, we are not on the agenda for the meeting, but it is an open public comment session. This is the LAST one of those prior to the 21st when the special commission will be forced to vote on the BHA proposed rule to bring the season back based on lack of public notice and as such is the last chance you have to get your voice heard.

My proposed speech is below. I made a VERY clear decision not to call the opposition hysterical, or to accuse anyone of being emotion based. I wanted to focus on how this decision was based on inaccurate accusations about our hunt. Another theme worth exploring would be "budgetary considerations of conservation", hinging on drawing a specific line between those who have framed themselves as conservationist (anti-hunters) and those who fund the lions share of conservation efforts with their time and money (hunters):

Speech:

In the schools of Denmark, children were told to bring rye bread for lunch. If they didn’t, their teachers called their lunch unhealthy. This may seem insignificant, but it was part of a large push to denigrate immigrant cultures as not being appropriately “Danish”. Today anti-hunting groups that slander us as being “mama bear killing trophy hunters” are doing just that. These groups have told me that my food is not civilized enough, and tragically on November 19th 2021 four special commission members agreed with that message and took away one of my ways of feeding myself.

I’ve spent the last few decades trying to develop a close relationship to the land that feeds me. It’s been a progression from cooking to gardening, gardening to farming, and most recently farming to hunting. This relationship was best put into words by the hunter conservationist Aldo Leopold:

“There are two spiritual dangers in not owning a farm. One is the danger of supposing that breakfast comes from the grocery, and the other that heat comes from the furnace.”

We are in grave spiritual and physical danger on both counts. Physically, from climate change. and spiritually, from our disconnection with the land. I cannot view further disconnection to the land as progress.

Animals are destroyed or displaced to grow my vegetables, and the meat on my plate did not materialize within Styrofoam and plastic wrapping. As a hunter and farmer I have looked these costs in the eye and have become much less wasteful as a result. I became a conservationist through hunting. I would be willing to argue that case to anyone in any forum given the chance. But that chance was taken from us in relation to spring bear.

The rule change that ended our hunt as it still appears on the WDFW website makes no mention of the words cancellation, ban, or outlaw. Nothing was said about the ethics of fair chase, nor any concerns brought up about the harvest of lactating sows. Had they been hunter conservationists would have been given an opportunity to speak up, to point out the science, and to demonstrate our ethical way of life. The disparity between what was proposed and what was done was vast enough to be a breach in public trust.

On January 21st the special commission has the opportunity to correct this. Before the vote is cast I’d like to remind each member that their mandate is to “… preserve, protect and perpetuate fish, wildlife and ecosystems while providing sustainable fish and wildlife recreational and commercial opportunities.”

Forcing us to buy from the supermarket is not a part of that mission.

Thank you.
 
RG_Adult_Onset_Hunter said:
A correction I should make, the 14th is the public comment day (with the 13th being the general discussions that we can view). No, we are not on the agenda for the meeting, but it is an open public comment session. This is the LAST one of those prior to the 21st when the special commission will be forced to vote on the BHA proposed rule to bring the season back based on lack of public notice and as such is the last chance you have to get your voice heard.

My proposed speech is below. I made a VERY clear decision not to call the opposition hysterical, or to accuse anyone of being emotion based. I wanted to focus on how this decision was based on inaccurate accusations about our hunt. Another theme worth exploring would be "budgetary considerations of conservation", hinging on drawing a specific line between those who have framed themselves as conservationist (anti-hunters) and those who fund the lions share of conservation efforts with their time and money (hunters):

Speech:

In the schools of Denmark, children were told to bring rye bread for lunch. If they didn’t, their teachers called their lunch unhealthy. This may seem insignificant, but it was part of a large push to denigrate immigrant cultures as not being appropriately “Danish”. Today anti-hunting groups that slander us as being “mama bear killing trophy hunters” are doing just that. These groups have told me that my food is not civilized enough, and tragically on November 19th 2021 four special commission members agreed with that message and took away one of my ways of feeding myself.

I’ve spent the last few decades trying to develop a close relationship to the land that feeds me. It’s been a progression from cooking to gardening, gardening to farming, and most recently farming to hunting. This relationship was best put into words by the hunter conservationist Aldo Leopold:

“There are two spiritual dangers in not owning a farm. One is the danger of supposing that breakfast comes from the grocery, and the other that heat comes from the furnace.”

We are in grave spiritual and physical danger on both counts. Physically, from climate change. and spiritually, from our disconnection with the land. I cannot view further disconnection to the land as progress.

Animals are destroyed or displaced to grow my vegetables, and the meat on my plate did not materialize within Styrofoam and plastic wrapping. As a hunter and farmer I have looked these costs in the eye and have become much less wasteful as a result. I became a conservationist through hunting. I would be willing to argue that case to anyone in any forum given the chance. But that chance was taken from us in relation to spring bear.

The rule change that ended our hunt as it still appears on the WDFW website makes no mention of the words cancellation, ban, or outlaw. Nothing was said about the ethics of fair chase, nor any concerns brought up about the harvest of lactating sows. Had they been hunter conservationists would have been given an opportunity to speak up, to point out the science, and to demonstrate our ethical way of life. The disparity between what was proposed and what was done was vast enough to be a breach in public trust.

On January 21st the special commission has the opportunity to correct this. Before the vote is cast I’d like to remind each member that their mandate is to “… preserve, protect and perpetuate fish, wildlife and ecosystems while providing sustainable fish and wildlife recreational and commercial opportunities.”

Forcing us to buy from the supermarket is not a part of that mission.

Thank you.
Click to expand...
Nice. Take a look at the 3rd to last paragraph, I had a hard time following what you were saying.
 
RG_Adult_Onset_Hunter said:
In looking at that data I did notice something rather important.

1211 of the 1862 comments started with the exact same phrase

"Dear Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife,

Washington prides itself on its beautiful outdoors and wild creatures, and the"

Several others are reworded versions of the same thing. Here is one such version:

"Dear Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife,

I am writing to urge you to ban the spring black bear hunt.

Washington prides itself on its beautiful outdoors and wild creatures, and the state’s wildlife management should reflect these values.
The hunt is inhumane, putting bears who have just emerged from hibernation under incredible stress and orphaning bear cubs.
Stopping the spring hunt won’t inconvenience hunters, who have opportunities to take bears in fall. And, as the department’s staff have acknowledged, the hunt has no impact on protecting timber stands — often cited as the reason for the hunt.

Decisions about our state’s wildlife should be made based on the best available science, and management and should reflect the will of most Washington residents. The spring bear hunt fails to meet either of those criteria. It’s a cruel trophy hunt that tears apart bear families and causes unnecessary death and suffering.

For the sake of wildlife and wild places, please stop this hunt now.
Thank you for reading this letter."

The phrase "Washington prides itself on its beautiful outdoors and wild creatures, and the state’s wildlife management should reflect these values. " appears 1266 times in the data. Not surprising given that both PETA and the Humane Society had form letter links to the commissioner site.

The word "trophy" was found in 1355 of the 1862 comments. This was a well funded and well orchestrated smeer campaign against ever single bear hunter in the state. It's provably wrong (we are legally required to take the meat) and has caused us actual harm. I can't help but be curious as to the legitimacy of a case for defamation of character in this instance. From the looks of this whole mess a lot of this started with a few Seattle residents who pursued legal action to stop the hunt, and it snowballed from there. Is fighting fire with fire appropriate?
Click to expand...

We must be strategic, and do it with respect and integrity. The letter above states “Decisions about our state’s wildlife should be made based on the best available science.” They follow up with no science. They share no data, and share no references. We must do the opposite.

I do not agree next sentence about doing what citizens want in this case. Some decisions are based only upon opinions and feelings. In the realm of wildlife management, we should be resting our decisions in Science. Honestly, sometimes it leads to decisions I don’t “like.” In this case it does.
 
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