Bear Management – A Pennsylvania Success Story
No species has benefited more from scientific wildlife management during the past 30 years than Pennsylvania’s black bear. Due to this success, we have more wild bears in the state than anytime in the past 200 years.
Throughout the 1960s, the annual harvest during the then-standard six-day season ranged from a high of 605 in 1966 to a low of 218 in 1968, with an average kill of 250. During this period, great political pressure was placed on the Pennsylvania Game Commission almost every year. If the harvest was low, as it was in 1961 and 1968, it was viewed as evidence that the bear population was dangerously low. If hunters had an abnormally high kill, it was viewed as a sign that bears would soon become extinct in the state.
When too-high harvest years of 1966 and 1967 were followed by two seasons with very low kills, the commission gave in to the pressure and closed bear season in 1970. That was the first closure since 1934. At that time, it was believed that our bear population was about, and I stress the word “about,” 4000 individuals.
The truth, according to Joe Kosack in his book, “The Pennsylvania Game Commission 1895-1995 – 100 Years of Wildlife Conservation” was, “In reality, no one really knew how many bears the state had.” The Commission also didn’t have any control on how many people hunted bears.
As it turned out, the 1970 closure of the hunting season was a wake-up call that led to the beginnings of intensive bear research and biological management. Mandatory bear check stations were established in 1973. Gary Alt began working with bears as a part of Penn State’s Wildlife Research Unit in 1974, while low harvests continued into the 1970s. Alt was hired to head the commission’s bear research effort in 1977. Bear season was closed in 1977 and again in 1978, while Alt began to assess the population.
The season was shortened and different time slots were experimented with. The law protecting cub bears was abolished in 1980 because it was impossible for hunters to identify cubs under many hunting situations. A bear license was established for the 1981 season, with a limit of 125,000 available licenses. Harvests began to steadily increase as the better-protected bear population also increased in size and range – so much so, that the license allocation limit was eliminated in 1989.
During the over 25 years of Alt’s research, more was learned about black bears than ever before. Among other things, it was learned that Pennsylvania bears grow faster, get larger, and reproduce more rapidly than black bears anywhere else in the world. Through an extensive trapping and marking program, a very close population estimate of our bears was calculated as we watched their numbers nearly double.
Hundreds of adult and cub bears are tranquilized, weighed, aged and tagged each year as the research continues to this day. A reasonably large tagged sample is necessary for the commission to continue to keep tabs on the bear population.
While cleaning out a pile of old “Pennsylvania Sportsman” magazines a few days ago, I found it amusing to learn that, while Alt was right on with his bear predictions, he was badly off with his evaluation of people’s adaptability to bears. In the September 1992 article by Ashley March, Alt was quoted as saying, “Pennsylvania could accommodate a much larger bear population than it now has.” [It was then 7500.] “…But the 12 million residents of Pennsylvania probably wouldn’t tolerate a much higher population, so the Game Commission feels that 7500 bears is optimum.”
As we approach the 2002 three-day season, current PGC bear biologist Mark Ternent estimates the bruin population at nearly 15,000 – just a tad above Alt’s optimum level! Even with state bear harvests at about 3,000 per year, the population continues to grow and expand its range. Bears might now be seen in any of our 67 counties, while hunters harvest bears from 50 or more counties each season – up from about 25 counties, mainly in the northcentral and northeastern mountains, 30 years ago.The Centre, Clinton, Lycoming and Clearfield county bear harvests continue to rank in the top ten counties of the state, but many more bears are available in counties such as Blair, Bedford, and Huntingdon, than current harvests would indicate. Hunters have yet to adjust to the shift in populations.
It is amazing that in 2001, more bears were harvested in Clinton County than in the entire state just 27 years ago. That’s wildlife management success.
Watch this page for more about Pennsylvania bears as local hunters get ready for the 2002 season that opens on November 25.
Mark Nale can be reached at MarkAngler@aol.com
