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Florida Black Bears were hunted this past year after finally getting them off the Endangered Species list in 2012. They had been on that list for 38 years. Rick Scott & FWC are reversing these efforts by bringing back the black bear hunt

THIS YEAR IN 2015:

• 298 BEARS KILLED IN 2 DAYS
• FWC said they had control over baiting & nursing moms. 
• Baiting & killing of underweight bears happened in multiple instances. 
• Hunt was cut off early because they were massacred so quickly
• An estimated 38 mother bears were killed
• about two-thirds of all bears were killed on private land, according to a POLITICO Florida analysis of partial data from the hunt.

 

• Bear permit sales totaled more than $376,900 and "plans call for using that to help fund abatement of human/bear conflicts through comprehensive waste management efforts in Florida." <- THIS WAS A LIE 

 

•  After the bear hunt, a Sanctuary owner was called to come investigate a young orphaned cub up in a tree at his friends house. (This sanctuary already has two bears & experience w/ them). They called FWC who told them that the bear was old enough to fend for itself & to leave it alone in the tree. The sanctuary owner offered to take in the bear to raise it until it could be re-released, but was instead told that if they called again about the bear cub that it would be considered a nuisance bear & killed.

 

• THE HUNT WAS NOT FOR SUSTAINABILITY 
• IT WAS NOT ABOUT BEAR CONFLICTS (in fact, it increased conflict as the bears were spooked or left orphaned from hunt, leaving them to wander into towns nearby
• It was about killing animals for sport
• Out of 376k of profits, they can't even take care of the orphaned cubs left behind. 

There is already talk of a 2016 Black Bear Hunt. Let's stop this before it's too late again & more innocent animal lives are lost. 

Sign this petition to tell Rick Scott & FWC NO to this money-making massacre of bears happening again!

Please, don't let this happen to our Florida Black Bears again. They only come in contact with us by accident while looking for food. There are proven solutions to bear encounters that don't involve killing. Please read them below. The section below is from the Humane Society. 

How to prevent conflicts with bears:
To avoid habituating the bears in your area, follow these steps.

• Make trash cans inaccessible. Bring them inside at night or buy a bear-resistant trash canor an enclosure for the container.
• Enclose your compost pile. Open compost piles, especially those that include kitchen scraps, are an irresistible treat in bear country. Burying compost won’t work because bears will easily find and dig it up.
• Recycle wisely. If you store recyclables outside, use enclosed bins. (Persistent bears will break into even ruggedly built bins.)
• Keep your barbecue grill clean and as free of drippings as possible. Move the grill away from your house when you aren’t using it, and clean it regularly with ammonia or bleach.
• Rethink your bird feeders. In the summer, birds can make do with naturally available foods. If you do set up feeders, install them away from your house.

Why hunting doesn’t solve conflicts with bears:
When communities start experiencing conflicts with bears, too often state wildlife agencies institute a hunt or raise the quota of an existing hunt. But a host of studies show that hunting does nothing to resolve human-bear conflicts; hunters target bears in the woods, not the ones causing problems near human habitation.

Hunting also does not permanently reduce bear populations. Numbers actually rebound with the increased availability of food

Florida Black Bears are a signature and beautiful example of Florida Wildlife. They are foragers with a great sense of smell, sight, and hearing. Their diet consists mostly of fruit and vegetation. They avoid humans whenever they can, and the only time they usually come around is when they are looking for food. We are taking away their habitats and replacing it with shopping malls and selfish human needs. Now that we have forced them into small habitats and taken away their forests, we think the solution is to kill them?

There are much better ways to deal with these foragers, and together we can solve the bear problem without taking any lives.