{"id":59465,"date":"2025-11-24T23:30:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-24T23:30:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/59465\/"},"modified":"2025-11-24T23:30:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-24T23:30:08","slug":"judge-rules-that-floridas-bear-hunt-will-go-on","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/59465\/","title":{"rendered":"Judge rules that Florida&#8217;s bear hunt will go on"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A judge in Tallahassee rejected today a plea from a Central Florida bear advocacy group to<a href=\"https:\/\/www.orlandosentinel.com\/2025\/11\/24\/last-ditch-effort-to-stop-floridas-bear-hunt\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"> halt the state\u2019s planned bear hunt.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Circuit Judge Angela Dempsey ruled against Bear Warriors United after more than two hours of testimony and arguments from the Seminole County group\u2019s lawyer, Thomas Crapps, and lawyers for the Florida Fish &amp; Wildlife Conservation Commission and Safari Club International, a pro-hunting organization that was allowed to make arguments for the state\u2019s first bear hunt in a decade.<\/p>\n<p>The judge said a temporary injunction was an \u201cextraordinary and drastic remedy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>She said foes of the hunt, set for Dec. 6 through Dec. 28 in four specially designated hunting zones, had not proved their argument that the bear harvest \u2014 a term FWC uses for the hunt \u2014 would cause irreparable harm to the once-threatened species.<\/p>\n<p>Dempsey noted the hunt is more limited than the October 2015 hunt in which hunters killed 304 bears in just two days.<\/p>\n<p>The wildlife agency crafted rules designed to take female bears out of hunters\u2019 crosshairs by setting the season in December when female bears tend to limit their range and begin denning with cubs for the winter, , said Mike Orlando FWC\u2019s bear expert.<\/p>\n<p>He said female bears are more critical for the sustainability of the species.<\/p>\n<p>Unlike 2015, the upcoming hunt is limited to 172 hunters who won a permit through a lottery system.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.orlandosentinel.com\/2025\/11\/24\/last-ditch-effort-to-stop-floridas-bear-hunt\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Last-ditch effort to stop Florida\u2019s bear hunt<\/a><\/p>\n<p>A permit allows the holder to kill one bear.<\/p>\n<p>Bear Warriors United argued that FWC relied on \u201coutdated and obsolete data\u201d to authorize a hunt.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTheir decision was not based on sound science, it\u2019s political,\u201d Crapps said of the wildlife commissioners.<\/p>\n<p>Orlando said the hunt is intended to slow the species\u2019 growth. FWC estimates about 4,000 bears roam the state.<\/p>\n<p>Karina Shadix, founder of Bear Warriors United, was distraught over the judge\u2019s ruling.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m just devastated that 172 innocent souls will lose their life and that so many people will take pleasure in killing,\u201d she said, replying by text. \u201cThe FWC\u2019s own science proves that bear populations are declining. Loss of habitat, vehicle strikes and poaching are causing real threats of extinction. A trophy hunt will be the final nail in the bears\u2019 coffin.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>shudak@orlandosentinel.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A judge in Tallahassee rejected today a plea from a Central Florida bear advocacy group to halt the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":59466,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1563,28,30,29,114,266,115,109],"class_list":{"0":"post-59465","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-florida","8":"tag-environment","9":"tag-florida","10":"tag-florida-headlines","11":"tag-florida-news","12":"tag-latest-headlines","13":"tag-local-news","14":"tag-news","15":"tag-social"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59465","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=59465"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59465\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/59466"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=59465"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=59465"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=59465"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}