Why Reforming State Game Commissions is so Important

There is perhaps no issue we view as more important than reforming Game and Fish Departments across our country. We have said many times nothing will have more impact on our lands, water and wildlife than this reform. Over the past few months we have looked nationally at what is occurring andsee clear evidence that many Game and Fish Departments are in need of serious reform.

From Bear Baying in South Carolina, to coyote penning in North Carolina, to the complete slaughter of wolves in Montana, Game and Fish departments are not becoming more progressive, but relics of a bygone era.

But it does not end there, the battle over trapping continues and many states appear dug in to the idea that trapping is part of the custom and culture of their state. We know that trapping must be eliminated, and such rational makes no sense in a modern and educated society.

The more we research and investigate, the more disturbing the story becomes on a national level!

Game and Fish departments are run by commissions; they are generally chosen by the Governor as political payback and depending on the state are tied to specific interests. In the West, that translates to ranching and oil and gas interests.

The agencies themselves use these commissions to cover their lack of Peer reviewed science, and the killing of predator species. In many states they also continue to allow trapping, because sportsmen continue to say if trapping is removed, then it’s only a matter of time before hunting is outlawed.

It’s time than Game and Fish Departments move into the 21st century. But as long as departments gain most of their revenue from hunting and trapping tags, and the tax on firearms and ammunition, we are left with little or no voice.

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Greater Yellowstone grizzlies: 'The road to recovery'

Courtesy photo/Neale Blank

Written by Gib Mathers
Powell Tribune

A grizzly bear takes five near Indian Pond in Yellowstone National Park. The grizzly bear population in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem has enjoyed a remarkable recovery in recent decades. But, with the recent spate of grizzly bear attacks on humans, officials and others plan to escalate the bear safety message hoping to curb nasty encounters with the bruins.

Population rebound a ‘success story’

(Editor’s note: This is the first part in a series exploring the history of grizzly bear recovery efforts in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.)

The grizzly bear population rebound in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem “is probably the biggest success story in endangered species recovery in the last 100 years,” said Mark Bruscino, bear management program supervisor for the Wyoming Game and Fish Department.

Although the bears’ habitat has been depleted significantly in the last 100 years or more, today’s grizzly population has stabilized in the ecosystem after plunging to fewer than 100 bears in the 1970s. This year’s count is conservatively estimated at nearly 600 grizzlies.

Yellowstone National Park was one of the last sanctuaries for grizzlies in the lower 48 states, said an Interagency Grizzly Bear Study Team 2008 report, “Grizzly Bears in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem: From Garbage, Controversy and Decline to Recovery.”

Historically, seeing grizzly and black bears was a choice attraction for sightseers to Yellowstone National Park. By the 1880s, visitors assembled to observe the bruins devouring garbage dumped behind park hotels. By 1910, black bears learned to mooch food from tourists in wagons. In 1907 park staff were killing some grizzly and black bears due to human-bear conflicts, said the report.

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