Green Jersey

How many bears does it take to bring back a bear hunt?

Image via wildlifemanagementpro.com.

Legislators yesterday demanded state environmental officials say how many bears are roaming around New Jersey.

State Sen. Steven Oroho, Assemblywoman Alison Littell McHose and Assemblman Gary Chiusano want the state to be more aggressive in its bear management and give its best guess of the bear population.

But the DEP said yesterday it doesn’t have statewide numbers. What it has is a “study area” estimate — the number of bears biologists say are roaming a 580-square-mile study region. It also has a best-guess of the bear population in the study region in 2010 — 3,056, or more than five bears per square miles, a projection first released in 2005.

The New Jersey Herald says the latest monthly report of bear encounters covered populations along the Kitatinny Ridge and at Bearfort Mountain from May 20 to June 20 and showed 44 percent more bear activity over last year — 369 calls about bears, compared to 256 the year before.

Another report showed the state’s black bear unit received 961 bear-related calls from Jan. 1 to June 20 compared to 600 for the same period in 2007, according to the Star-Ledger.

The state held bear hunts in 2003 and 2005, but not since. In a letter to the DEP yesterday, Oroho, McHose and Chiusano called for a more aggressive approach to manage a “growing threat.” From the Ledger:

“After each hunt, we had less problems. That’s a fact. And I think the public should be able to see the DEP data showing what we already know — that mother bears are having three and four cubs now, not just one or two, and that we have more bears,” Oroho said.