Requiring hunters to check in the bears they kill yields lots of information, but at what cost?
Check stations have been one of the hallmarks of Pennsylvania bear hunting for decades.
Might it be time to run them less often?
That’s what at least one Game Commissioner is wondering.
Right now, hunters who bag a bruin in the statewide archery season or one of the extended seasons is to call that in to one of the agency’s regional offices. A wildlife conservation officer is then sent out to check the kill.
During the statewide firearms season, though, hunters who bag a bear are required to take it to a check station for processing – they’re weighed, aged and more – within 24 hours.
Commissioner Jim Daley of Cranberry Township noted that the stations are costly to run, as they have to be manned by multiple employees. That’s something to consider these days, when the commission is struggling to fund operations, he said.
Commission executive director said the agency is facing a $7.8 million budget shortfall as of July 1.
“I think we need to be cutting costs,” Daley said. “If we don’t need to check bears, let’s not check bears.”
At the least, he said, the commission could perhaps go to running check stations every few years.
Agency biologists don’t like that idea, though.
Wayne Laroche, chief of the bureau of wildlife management, said the commission’s wealth of bear check data said that gives it a lot of credibility with hunters and others. By comparison, he said, the commission’s deer program – though scientifically valid — doesn’t enjoy the same perception.
“We don’t want to get in the same situation we’re in with deer,” Laroche said.
Mark Ternent, the commission’s bear biologist, added that the information collected at check stations still has value.
Right now, he noted, commissioners are thinking of moving up the archery bear season a week in 2017 to coincide with the last week or archery deer season. Over the last few years they’ve extended and shortened firearms bear seasons across a number of wildlife management units.
Without check stations, he said, the information to make those decisions wouldn’t be there.
