nah. i don't hike anymore.Originally Posted by berkshirebirder
I read or rather skimmed the paper and I'm not sure how actual population and effective population are related, but from what I gathered from the following definition they are not neccessarily linearly related. I wish the paper was more clear on that, and more easy for me to understand, but like most papers it was written for a different audience than myself, and a somwhat different purpose than what I am trying to extract from it. I find the use of genetics in such population studies to be very interesting, but way beyond me, at least for now. Maybe I will find some time to catch up a little, or bump into a biology buddy that might bring me up to speed at least a little.
From the paper...
"The effective population size is the number of breeding individuals in an idealized population that would show the same amount of dispersion of allele frequencies under random genetic drift or the same amount of inbreeding as the population under consideration."
Reading it over, that number appears to apply to management zones 1 & 3. The numbers appear drawn from Table 1. Zones two and four had low sample sizes. It does not apply to the whole state which might be different or not different.
It is noted the technique was based on mark recapture in 2001 and genetics later so there could a little discrepancy in that number due to differing techniques.
That is a large increase no doubt but another figure of interest would be the bear pop. density and how does it relate to other regions. Plus I'd bet other information about population dynamics and stuff about wildlife biology I don't know.
"Sleepy alligator in the noonday sun
Sleepin by the river just like he usually done
Call for his whisky
He can call for his tea
Call all he wanta but he can't call me..."
Robert Hunter & Ron McKernan
Of course not! It's just walking after all!
Some folks get all macho-ish about "HIKING".
As I live, declares the Lord God, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that the wicked turn back from his way and live. Ezekiel 33:11
Did Adam and Eve rest on the first Sabbath? Scripture only says that God did. Are we thinking yet?
Oh, btw, just weighing in on the hunting thing -
Go ahead - that may be the only way the bears get a healthy fear of man. Relocating problem bears only makes it someone else's problem. Repeat offenders are routinely terminated. Those with a healthy fear of humans will be the least likely to be shot.
........or, move the HUMANS out
As I live, declares the Lord God, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that the wicked turn back from his way and live. Ezekiel 33:11
Did Adam and Eve rest on the first Sabbath? Scripture only says that God did. Are we thinking yet?
the bears that get hunted are dead, they aremt afraid of anything anymore. the ones still alive if they werent afraid i dont see how they will be afterwards. do bears talk to each other about how so and so got shot by some humans? plus its timed so that many are already in hibernation.Oh, btw, just weighing in on the hunting thing -
Go ahead - that may be the only way the bears get a healthy fear of man. Relocating problem bears only makes it someone else's problem. Repeat offenders are routinely terminated. Those with a healthy fear of humans will be the least likely to be shot.
........or, move the HUMANS out
Yeah I thought about the practice of using dogs also. I guess baiting for bears is more ethical, but only if bow hunting maybe, I guess I really don't have enough info to really make an intelligent response to the issue. And that is the problem with any issue. We comment on things that we do not know all the facts about. I am not a bear hunter. I don't know if I would go if even invited. Not that I am scared of the bears mind you, but I would like to know more about the method of harvesting the bear before I could kill one. They are not considered a varmint so I would not feel comfortable with a dog chase/hunt and I don't agree with the baiting method but the wildlife needs to be managed.
I think the theoretical limit of natural increase in black bear populations, not counting immigration, is roughly to double every 2 years, so you could get a 32 fold increase in 10 years at the absolute best. Without hunting and car collisions, if natural forms of premature death take 25% of the population each year, evenly distributed, this would knock it down to a 7.6 fold increase every 10 years. Actually, that doesn't take into account that they don't reach maturity until around age 4, which I think lowers the number some. Also, they are dependant on their mother for at least the first summer, so if the mother dies during that time, that would usually take the cubs out also. The most siginificant control on bear population, in the absence of human intervention, would be factors that would kill the bears in their first 4 years, and also factors that reduce fertility rates. I think food shortage is the most obvious. Perhaps infanticide also, but I think that would also be closely related to food shortage, and crowding.
So what does hunting do? Well, it would result in less competition for food amongst bears, which would result in lower starvation rates, and also higher fertility rates. I think this means hunting leads to somewhat shorter but somewhat happier lives. Not sure. Maybe bears would be happier fighting over limited resources rather than being selectively controlled. What makes a bear happy in the grand scheme of things?
Some animal rights groups favour contraceptives over huntiing. That just seems way wrong to me. I think we need to be part of the process, but it has to be a natural process, and I think that means some limited amount of hunting, and also allowing natural forces to work as they should by limiting food sources. This means hunting deer also, and not providing sources of food for bears. I am not against using food for bait, but if it is overdone it is counter-productive for population management. It becomes farming at some point, which is also the wrong way to go. I think food should only be put out for bears for a very limited time span, not for weeks in advance of the so-called hunting season to make it easier for 'clients' of 'guides'.
If it could be done effectively without food entirely, that would be preferable. I think the only other alternatives are:
1. traps - which are too dangerous
2. chase dogs - which I think cause too much disturbance
3. hunting them during hibernation - which I really do think makes the most sense
people come before bears. a hunt is needed once again to control the population. it's really very simple
I also tend to be against hunting bears through professional guides and lodges. The only reason I am against this is that too much money comes into play, which causes un-natural forces to come into play. So it ends up being rather like dude-ranching, where bears are practically farmed, the bear population is controlled in a manner which is optimized for sport and profit rather than for a healthy natural environment. I think it would be better if people had to do their own hunting. The meat and the pelts should be the source of revenue. If that is not enough to encourage enough hunting, then maybe the bears need to win a little, and that will get people hunting. Maybe bounties. It shouldn't really be done for 'sport' though. There is nothing wrong with taking some pleasure in it, if it neccessary and done properly, but I don't have much taste for trophy hunting as such, especially when you consider how bears need to be hunted.
In their lairs with a rope around their foot and pointed stick. Now that would be hunting, even if they were rather woozy. Then I think it would be ok to have a guide along, but only to make sure it was done right and proper. The bear should be eaten also. Every last drop of bear fat. You could get some help on that part also.
It still amazes me how little we know of bears, or at least how little I know. Population numbers, for example, seem to vary greatly, like anywhere from 400,000 to 1 million. That's alot of bear. Hunting takes about 20,000 in Canada and about the same number in the U.S. so perhaps 5% hunting is needed to control the bear population. In some cases it exceeds 10%, and I think that starts to get into farming, but I could be mistaken.
I don't think alot of bear meat and bear fat gets eaten these days. I think this is a shame, and perhaps even disrespectful, but again I could be mistaken. Not sure how much meat and fat are on the average bear. Say 40,000 bear x 50 pounds anyway, perhaps 100 pounds, so 2,000,000 to 4,000,000 pounds. Now that's alot of bear, but we gotta lotta people also. Personally I haven't been having any of my share of bear meat, which amounts to about 1 oz of bear meat per year. So I have fallen about 3 pounds short, perhaps 4 pounds when you consider the smaller population in Canada when I was born. So who's been eating my bear?
Still, 4 pounds in 48 years ain't much meat from 1,000,000 bears.
We must have ALOT of cows and pigs and chickens.
I had to look it up. Still not sure, but I think my eating habits require the maintainence of a population of about half a cow, half a pig, and maybe 5-10 chickens, not counting milk and eggs. Personally I think I would like to cut back some on cows and pigs and chickens, and make room for just a little more bear, moose, deer, rabbits, and squirrel now and then. I also like lamb and duck, and goose, but don't get that very often either, just special occassions. It's crazy how much cow and pig and chicken I go through without hardly noticing them, and I don't think I eat as much as most people.
LW again! If they are causing such a big problem, kill em. It seems obvious that the population is out of control, something has to be done to get the balance back. If it keeps up you will see even more problems like disease.
Daughter (SOBO 09) just called, she grows cultivated blueberries here in W. MM. She has a big bear eating the berries as I write this, my brother is going over to deal with it.
Debatable.
"With man gone will there be hope for gorilla? With Gorilla gone will there be hope for man?"
Wilderness is not a luxury but a necessity of the human spirit, and as vital to our lives as water and good bread.
-Edward Abbey
Yes, even if it keeps just one individual from being mauled to death, that is unless you have an better solution to the problem. A hunt 'should' help prevent but not eliminate this and many other problems that occur with the bear overpopulation. Face it certain individuals will never act responsible in bear country, only wish we could eliminate them. I'm not saying that its right or wrong just the easiest means of controlling the population so someone doesn't end up in that situation and its bound to happen again as it has in the past. I've been hearing of more and more bear encounter lately and not just in NJ. Nope I'll take may chance with the snakes. Don't know of too many people in the US who have died from snake bites. Ever wrestle a bear, I have, many years ago, and I'm glad he had a muzzle on and someone to pull him off of me. Hey, maybe that's the solution, maybe we should legalize bear wrestling again.
I am thinking we should keep the bears. No doubt their presence all this publicity is keeping gang bangers and serial murders out of the backcountry.
If keeping extra bears around saves one person from being assaulted by such scum, it will be worth it.
On a more serious note, I am reminded on the monthly walks I lead at conservation properties around my suburban home just how fearful people are. And these are the folks who come out. If some of these good folks perception was to be acted upon, we would trap every fox (rabies, don't you know) and every coyote (they eat cats) around. Earlier in the week the scare story in the Boston Glob was the return of fishers to suburbia.
I take a somewhat different view. If you have zero tollerance on the risk bear attacks, then you would have to have zero bears. So why don't we have zero tollerance for automobile accidents? We have speed limits. Lowering the speed limit by 10% would save alot of lives, but we tollerate a higher death rate for economic and convenience. So why not tollerate a very small death rate due to bear attacks, so we can have some bears as part of natural and diverse ecosystems. I think hunting needs to be part of that, as well as the killing of bears that intrude into densely populated areas, and problem bears in lower populated areas. But zero tolerance of bears makes no sense, when you compare it to other causes. Even from a human-centric viewpoint, most humans like to have bears around, and so we have to tolerate some level of human fatalities, even children. That's just the way it is.
not at all. not in jersey
I do think the government of New Jersey is doing the right thing, by doing the right thing regardless of public opinion. Government, once elected, has to what it things is right. On matters such as this, it should listen to experts, like from department of natural resources and so forth. I don't think they should listen to hunters, or guides, any more than they should listen to animal rights groups, or even the majority of voters if the majority of voters live in cities. They should keep people informed about what they are doing, and why they are doing it, and if the majority still want to get rid of them when the next election rolls around then so be it.
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