New Jersey is overrun with bears. More dangerously, they are losing their fear of humans. It’s really only a matter of time before there’s a horrible incident. Some politicians in New Jersey are beginning to criticize Jon Corzine, who’s caved to the animal rights folks on having a bear hunt:
“The Governor’s bear management policies are based on little more than a reflexive opposition to hunting, disregard of science and a dose of wishful thinking,†said Oroho. “The numbers compiled by the Division of Fish and Wildlife demonstrate a different approach is adamantly necessary.â€
We’ll see how cute the animal rights people think the bears are when they end up preying on children because the habitate available can’t sufficiently feed them.
UPDATE: In the mean time, we’re having a record bear harvest over here.
The animal rights people don’t really care if bears hurt or kill humans. I learned this by listening to their public statements when cougars kill joggers in California, and grizzlies kill hunters in Montana. The animal rights response is always something like, “Well, the [bear] [cougar] was just doing what is natural and so-and-so was, after all, in this animal’s territory.”
The even more astounding thing is when the person who got mauled says, “I don’t want anything done to that bear. It was not his fault. I was in his back yard.”
Even coyotes snatching babies off porches in California does not elicit any sympathy from the animal rights folks.
When it comes to wild animal attacks on humans there is a lot of nutty thinking going on, and not all of it is by the animal rights activists.
You will know how right I am when the first human is mauled or killed by a black bear in NJ, and the response from the animal rights side is to defend the bear, and to remain steadfast against hunting them.
For the hard core animal rights folks, yeah. A lot of them don’t live anywhere near the bears. But a lot of folks aren’t hard core fanatics about it, but might have vague notions that “Ohh… cute little bears. Shooting them would be awful.”
For someone who doesn’t like the idea of a bear hunt, but aren’t ideologically animal rights activists, having the thought of one eating your child might be enough to make them acquiesce to a bear hunt.
The animal rights response is always something like, “Well, the [bear] [cougar] was just doing what is natural and so-and-so was, after all, in this animal’s territory.â€
Yup, and by carrying a firearm to defend themselves from such animals, humans are only doing what is natural.
We’ll see how cute the animal rights people think the bears are when they end up preying on children because the habitate available can’t sufficiently feed them.
The animal rights people will see that as a feature, not a bug.
“Well, the [bear] [cougar] was just doing what is natural and so-and-so was, after all, in this animal’s territory.â€
Eh, there’s probably a little wiggle room here. If you were wandering along, saw a bear cub by itself (or a hibernating adult) and got very close, I wouldn’t be at all surprised to get attacked. I wouldn’t hold it against the bear in that case. If one started stalking my toddler…yes.
Bear season’s coming up here in what, a week or so, I think.
i beleive that there have been bear attacks on children in NJ so that has already occured. But the anti hunting folks have the political clout.
Crossbows are quiet. I would shoot a bear with one if it came anywhere near my house, no matter what the law says.
Shoot, shovel, shut up.
Shovel? Bear probably tastes pretty good.
Grizzly attacks in Wyoming, Montana and Alaska are usually unprovoked. The person attacked is usually not in the least at fault, except for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
But the victims often voice an odd sympathy to the bear that nearly took their life and horribly disfigured them for life. That does not seem to be a natural response, and I have always wondered where it comes from.
But maybe I’m weird in thinking that we humans are just as much a part of this world as bears and have just as much right to be in the forests and the mountains as the bears and the cougars.
A phenomenon that is interesting but difficult to explain is that where bears are hunted they tend to be less dangerous to humans. Maybe their powers of reasoning are greater than we think.
If something doesn’t change with the bear policy in New Jersey soon, I’m afraid that we will indeed see some sort of incident where somebody gets hurt or killed by a bear, just like what others have predicted.
If the anti-hunting extremists can still manage to persuade Jon Corzine to keep the bear hunting ban in place afterward, I think it might be time for some of us to take on the radical tactics of their side, i.e., the left-winger environmental and animal-rights “activists”. The types I’m referring to here are the ones who think it’s perfectly okay to throw molotov cocktails at the home of a scientific researcher who uses laboratory animals for clinical testing purposes.
What I mean by this is would be the quiet formation of a covert black bear poaching squad in New Jersey. Just a handful of friends, who are also all experienced hunters, equipped with night-vision gear, walkie-talkies, and crossbows, would be enough to thin the New Jersey black bear population back down to a safe and manageable number, all in a clandestine fashion, of course.
Sure, all of this would be very much illegal, and the animal-rights crowd would be livid if the media were to report on the apparent poaching too, but if somebody’s kid got mauled first by one of these black bears in New Jersey, I’m sure there would be some public support for such organized poaching efforts.