Posted December 20. 2009

Staff Report

         Kentucky’s First Bear Season Buried by Snow Storm --Heavy Snows Hit Three Eastern Kentucky Counties Open to Hunting

    Kentucky’s historic bear season, the first in the modern era of wildlife management, was buried by a snow storm.

    The three counties open to hunting December 19-20 -- Harlan, Letcher and Pike --were hit with a snowstorm, which dumped more than a foot of snow at higher elevations.

    The inclement weather impacted hunter access, and success. A total of 372 bear hunting permits were sold, but no bears were taken during the two-day season.

    Hunters will have to wait until next fall to get a crack at Kentucky’s growing population of bruins.

    Steven Dobey, bear program coordinator for the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources, said the area open to hunting has an estimated population of 300 bears,

    “The population has shown phenomenal growth from only a decade ago. We’ve been monitoring this population and have been involved in research with the University of Kentucky for almost 10 years. Based on our research efforts, it’s clear that Kentucky’s bear population can support a sustainable harvest.”

    Hunters in the five counties adjoining Kentucky’s bear zone, in West Virginia, Virginia and Tennessee, harvested 50 bears this fall, Dobey said.

    Black bears were nearly absent from Kentucky for about 150 years after intensive logging in the 19th century took away much of their habitat. They gradually made their way back to southeastern Kentucky from Virginia, West Virginia and Tennessee as oak-hickory forests matured once again.

    Natural reproduction of bears in Kentucky has occurred for at least five years.

    “The other driving force in this first bear season has been public interest and support from sporting organizations in Kentucky,” Dobey said.

     The harvest quota for the entire season is 10 bears total or five female bears, whichever limit hunters reach first.

    Dobey said female bears are already in their dens for the winter, with some denning as early as October, based information from radio-collared bears.

    The bag limit is one bear per hunter. The hunt is open to any Kentucky resident who purchases a $30 bear hunting permit in addition to an annual hunting license.

    Successful hunters must take their bear to one of the check-in stations set up in each of the open counties. Locations are listed at the department’s website: www.fw.ky.gov.

    Kentucky Fish and Wildlife biologists will weigh the bears, take body measurements and biological samples for research, and attach a permanent tag to each harvested animal. Hunters must also Telecheck their bear before leaving the check station.

    Hunters may not take female bears with cubs or bears weighing less than 75 pounds. A 75-pound bear is about the same size as an adult Labrador retriever. Baiting is prohibited, including garbage used as bait. For example, hunters may not shoot a bear feeding at a garbage can or dumpster.

    The Hensley-Pine Mountain Wildlife Management Area (WMA) is closed to bear hunting, and a 12,500-acre area surrounding the WMA is open only to landowners, their spouses and dependent children hunting on their own property. Those boundaries are clearly delineated in the 2009-10 Kentucky Hunting and Trapping Guide, available wherever hunting licenses are sold and online at fw.ky.gov.

    Hunters may also read about all equipment, licensing, hunter education and youth supervision laws in this guide. Hunter orange clothing is required for all bear hunters regardless of what hunting equipment they use, as the season coincides with late muzzleloader deer season.

    Most Kentucky hunters haven’t taken a bear before. However, hunters can use some of the same techniques they use for deer hunting. Hunters should begin by scouting ridgelines for hard mast food sources such as acorns.

    “In the fall and winter months, bears have only one thing on their minds and that’s putting on weight for the winter denning season,” Dobey said. “They’ll concentrate their activity almost exclusively around food sources.”

    In eastern Kentucky, mountain ridgelines hold the highest concentrations of these food sources. Bears are predictable in their daily travel patterns. Hunters should search for trails worn into the ground, paw prints in leaf litter or even claw marks on trees, as bears feed extensively in trees as well as under them. Once hunters find a stand of acorn-producing trees and other signs of bear activity, they can set up tree stands just as they do for deer hunting. Ground blinds can also be used.

    A bear’s sense of smell is even better than a deer’s, so there isn’t much hunters can do to cover up their scent. However, bears are also generally more curious than deer, as odors may indicate a potential food source. Since bears are trying to put on weight for winter denning, scent can actually work to a hunter’s advantage. Hunters should aim for the same vital area on a bear that they look for on a deer.

    Portions of 10 public hunting areas are open for bear hunting, though hunters should consult maps to ensure they hunt only within Harlan, Letcher and Pike counties. Excluding Hensley-Pine Mountain WMA, there are 29,651 acres of public land available to hunters within the three-county bear zone. Hunters must have landowner permission to hunt or retrieve downed bears from private land. 

                   Posted December 31, 2010

Staff Report

                                             First Black Bear of the Modern Era Taken During 2010 Season

Danny Smith of Phelps, Ky. carved his name into Kentucky’s hunting annals Saturday, Dec. 18, 2010, when he claimed the state’s first legally harvested black bear in the modern era.

            Smith took the 265-pound male bear in Pike County about five hours into his hunt. He owned the state’s record for the largest bear for about a day, until Billy Joe Dixon, of Cumberland, took a 280-pound male on the second day.

            Smith, a lifetime Pike County resident and long-time coyote and deer hunter, was hunting coyotes last Friday when he came across “a lot of bear sign in the snow near a stand of Autumn Olive”. That prompted him to go buy his bear hunting license.

            He hit the woods Saturday morning just after his Highway Department shift ended, but failed to find more bear sign. So he moved to an area where he had previously seen bear activity and picked up a fresh trail.

He followed it for more than a mile around a mountain top. When the track he was following approached the location where he had first found the track, he backed off and began watching the area.

He used binoculars to scour the area and finally spotted the bear about 240 yards away. He made the shot just before 2 p.m. with his Savage .270 rifle.

“I’ve hunted a lot of coyotes and deer, but this bear season is the best thing Kentucky could have,” said Smith. “This is the first time I have ever hunted them, but I am hooked for life.”

Kentucky’s first black bear season last year was tough on bear hunters after a winter storm dumped nearly two-feet of snow across Pike, Harlan and Letcher counties and kept the hunters off the mountains.  They were the only three counties open to bear hunting, and no bears were taken in that first season.

Dixon, 35, a lifetime resident of Cumberland, took the only other bear claimed this season Sunday about noon on the Harlan County mine property where he works.

He was already familiar with bear activity on the property. Like Smith, he took advantage of the fresh snowfall to track the bear.

He found a track crossing the road as he was climbing the mountain, followed the track, and then caught a glimpse of the bear heading down the mountain. He hurried down the mountain, set up in an area where he suspected the bear might show up, and soon made a 50-yard shot with his .308 rifle.

Then he tied the present with the past. He called upon his 84-year-old grandfather, Bill Dixon, of Hiram, to help him skin his trophy. That’s when he learned that his grandfather, while a young boy, was also present when another bear was taken on Pine Mountain, long before the days of regulated bear hunting in Kentucky.

“Bears are good opportunity for Kentucky,” said Dixon. “For those who don’t work in the mines, there’s not a lot to do. With our elk, deer and now bear, we have some real tourism opportunities.”

“Some people are simply not comfortable walking the mountains in snow-covered conditions to hunt bears,” said Steven Dobey, bear program coordinator for the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources. “For those willing to get out, however, the snow played a positive role in their ability to go into the record books.”

Kentucky’s initial bear seasons have been held in December in order to gauge hunter participation and success rates, while concentrating the harvest on male bears.  Most female bears in Kentucky enter dens by mid-November.

“This year’s hunt shows that mature bears can be harvested late in the season,” said Dobey. “Likewise, beginning with a late-season hunt allows us the maneuverability to move the season earlier in future years.”

Posted October 29, 2011

Staff Report

                                                                        2011 Black Bear Season Dates

    December 10-11 in Harlan, Letcher and Pike counties only. The bag limit is one bear per hunter. The hunt is open to any Kentucky resident who purchases a $30 bear hunting permit in addition to an annual hunting license.

    Successful hunters must take their bear to one of the check-in stations set up in each of the open counties. Locations are listed at the department’s website: www.fw.ky.gov.

    Kentucky Fish and Wildlife biologists will weigh the bears, take body measurements and biological samples for research, and attach a permanent tag to each harvested animal. Hunters must also Telecheck their bear before leaving the check station.

    Hunters may not take female bears with cubs or bears weighing less than 75 pounds. Baiting is prohibited, including garbage used as bait, and hunters may not take bears from dens.