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<\/a><\/p>\nMany animal rights activists entered the lottery to win permits with no plans to use them \u2014 only to keep them away from hunters. These activists said data the wildlife commission used to support the hunt, which showed 53% statewide increase in bear populations since 2002, was outdated because it was collected in 2014 to 2015.<\/p>\n
For its part, the agency said Florida black bear population counts can\u2019t be taken more frequently than the length of one generation, or 10 years. The Commission said the hunt was intended to slow bear population growth and manage the species\u2019 numbers before they outgrow their habitat.<\/p>\n
Florida plans to make the hunt an annual event, although details about next season\u2019s dates have not been released. Hunter success rates and the number of unused permits will be used to evaluate 2025 data and inform future hunts, spokesperson Shannon Knowles said in an email.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe goal was to put the permits in the hands of those who will use them for hunting,\u201d Knowles said.<\/p>\n
The ratio of hunting permits to bears hunted turned out to be similar to other states with similar hunt parameters, the Wildlife Commission said. It has promised a full harvest report to be released in the coming months.<\/p>\n
Nemeth, a retiree, said he was impressed with how the Commission managed the hunt. A lifelong hunter, he moved to Florida five years ago from Michigan, where he often went bear hunting \u2014 but was never successful.<\/p>\n Nemeth secured a lease to hunt on private land in Eastpoint, southwest of Tallahassee and four hours north of his home. A few large, older bears had been seen on the property, scaring away deer. Nemeth scouted these \u201cnuisance\u201d animals for months, analyzing footage and laying out feed, before traveling with his son to make the kill in early December.<\/p>\n The first two days of the hunt, he said, were rainy and miserable. But the sun emerged on the third day, and he and his son, Rees Nemeth, 27, took their spots at a blind. The camouflaged structure let them observe and shoot undetected. Just before daybreak, they saw a bear come to a nearby corn pile to eat. They waited for a clean shot \u2014 and took it.<\/p>\n Nemeth said he plans to enjoy the dark red bear meat in stews and chilis, as well as grilled in teriyaki sauce.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not a trophy hunter,\u201d he said. \u201cI hunt for meat. My freezer is full of game \u2014 my two gators are in there, and I\u2019ve got a couple pigs in there, a turkey, and we eat what we kill. And that\u2019s how it is, you know, I think that\u2019s the right way.\u201d<\/p>\n Chuck Mitchell, 73, of Tallahassee feels differently. After spending $1,000 on lottery tickets, at $5 per entry for 200 chances, he also secured a hunting permit. But he did so to keep a bear from being killed. Each person could buy unlimited entries, although they couldn\u2019t win more than one tag.<\/p>\n Mitchell has lived in Florida for 55 years and remembers the last bear hunt in 2015. No lottery system existed during that hunt; instead, the FWC sold an unlimited number of permits. The season was called off after just two days with 304 bears killed.<\/p>\n Although Mitchell describes himself as a hunter and fisher more than an animal rights activist, he doesn\u2019t support what he described as killing bears for trophies. He kills only animals he can eat, he said, and bear meat can sometimes be unpalatable depending on the bear\u2019s diet and fat content. While growing up in swampy North Carolina, he said, he would sooner kill and eat a raccoon or a possum than a bear.<\/p>\n He lives in Tallahassee adjacent to a nature preserve, where he often sees bears as close as 75 feet from his house. The shy animals never bother anyone, he said.<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re shooting something to prove you\u2019re a big hunter,\u201d he said. \u201cGun down a bear and call themselves a man.\u201d<\/p>\n Not all bear hunters are men. Ashlyn Croff, 33, and her husband both entered the lottery to win a permit. She won; he didn\u2019t. When she called to tell him, he hung up on her.<\/p>\n Croff has been hunting her entire life, heading out solo since she was 22 and \u201cdecided I don\u2019t need any man to go with me.\u201d<\/p>\n The Pensacola native hunted every day for 23 days to harvest a bear, occasionally letting her husband accompany her so as not to hurt his feelings. When she finally shot a 142-pound female in Wewahitchka, she was joined only by her 12-year-old son. It was one of the best experiences of her life, she said.<\/p>\n Croff knows the bear hunt had its critics. Like everyone who won a permit, she was offered $2,000 from Bear Warriors United, an Oviedo, Florida-based advocacy group, not to use her tag.<\/p>\n Although she appreciates these activists\u2019 love for animals, she said, hunters love animals, too. Bears frequently attack her feeders and cameras, scaring off other game, like deer. That keeps her from putting sustainably caught food on her family\u2019s table.<\/p>\n \u201cWhile (activists are) eating their beef at home, a cow was killed for that. While they\u2019re eating their hot dog, a little piggy was killed for that,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s the same exact thing, it\u2019s just not a big, black, fuzzy bear that is so cute on all of the magazines and on TV.\u201d<\/p>\n Activist Janis Ingham, 55, doesn\u2019t eat bear, hamburgers or any other meat. The Casselberry resident has been a vegan for 38 years, a decision she made for ethical reasons. She bought 350 bear tags, winning one, out of concern that Florida\u2019s decade-old bear counts were no longer accurate given recent development in Florida cutting into their habitats.<\/p>\n Ingham lives near the Black Bear Wilderness Area, a popular 7-mile hiking loop where she once spotted a bear herself. She described them as resilient, smart and social \u2014 a species to protect, not to hunt.<\/p>\n \u201cThis has become an awakening,\u201d she said. \u201cMany people \u2026 will pursue various avenues to try to put some guardrails in place so that this type of thing doesn\u2019t have to happen again, where people have to buy lottery tickets to get a permit to try to protect a particular animal.\u201d<\/p>\n Between about 40 and 50 activists won hunting permits. Unlike Mitchell, some didn\u2019t pay the $5 required for an entry into the lottery system. Instead, they gave their names and information to large buyers who bought tickets on their behalf.<\/p>\n Angels in Distress, an anti-hunting nonprofit, partnered<\/a> with Hurricane Pet Rescue to help people sign up and cover hunting license costs. The nonprofit\u2019s director, Steve Rosen, told the Orlando Sentinel he spent $200,000 of his own money. Rosen declined to comment for this story, writing in all-caps via email, \u201cStop bothering me. You are only out for yourself, not the bears like most all media hacks.\u201d<\/p>\n Levis Morales, a Broward County resident, heard about the hunt from his boss, who asked if he would be willing to sign up. He gave his information on a website, and a donor bought 300 tickets, the equivalent of $1,500, on his behalf. Morales was surprised to win a permit but proud to save a bear, he said.<\/p>\n Another permit winner, Karen Gray, who lives in Arizona, also gave her information to an animal rights group to buy permits on her behalf. A dog and cat rescue asked her if she would like to obtain a license so it would go unused and less bears would die, she said.<\/p>\n Gray declined to give the name of the rescue for fear of getting them in trouble or publicizing their plans. The rescue bought 350 tickets, costing $1,750, under her name.<\/p>\n \u201cI hope it had some impact and less bears were murdered,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n People from inside and outside Florida bought over 163,000 entries altogether, which would account for $817,000 in application fees alone. Out of the 172 permit winners, six came from outside the state, while the remainder were Florida residents.<\/p>\n The Wildlife Commission called the hunt a success. One hunter received a warning for a minor Wildlife Management Area violation, and no citations were issued, the agency said in a news release after the hunt. No wildlife violations were found.<\/p>\n ___<\/p>\n This story was produced by Fresh Take Florida, a news service of the University of Florida College of Journalism and Communications. The reporter can be reached at\u00a0[email\u00a0protected]<\/a>. You can donate to support our students\u00a0here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Most people who won permits to participate in the first Florida black bear hunt since 2015 came away…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":112220,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[57046,50327,30461,28,15748,30,29,14604,57047,57048],"class_list":{"0":"post-112219","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-florida","8":"tag-angels-in-distress","9":"tag-black-bear-hunt","10":"tag-black-bears","11":"tag-florida","12":"tag-florida-fish-and-wildlife-conservation-commission","13":"tag-florida-headlines","14":"tag-florida-news","15":"tag-hunting","16":"tag-shannon-knowles","17":"tag-steve-rosen"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112219","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=112219"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112219\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/112220"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=112219"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=112219"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=112219"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/JS-728x90-1.png\")
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