Inside Alaska's scapegoat killing of grizzly bears
The Humane Society of the United States
June 25, 2024
Under the guise of conservation, Alaska wildlife officials have recently killed 175 grizzly bears, including at least 20 cubs, as well as 19 wolves and five black bears.
The method of choice has largely been to shoot them from helicopters and airplanes.
These killings took place during the last two springs, when bears are coming out of hibernation with their cubs, as part of Alaska's "intensive management" of wildlife.
This program attempts to artifically grow the numbers of animals for hunters to shoot--- in this case, the Mulchatna caribou herd currently living in southwestern Alaska.
Starting in 2012, Alaska officials allowed the public to gun down wolves from aircraft with the aim of helping to grow this caribou herd.
But when the herd still showed no increase in size, officials decided also to target grizzlies, also known as brown bears, and black bears themselves.
This is nothing more than a scapegoat scheme, and the result has been an unconscionable toll on native carnivore populations for no justifiable reason whatsoever.
The killing of native bears and wolves ignores the reality that the Mulchatna herd faces: a degraded, overgrazed and fragile habitat further imperiled by climate change.
The herd is also plagued by disease (brucellosis) and rampant poaching.
No amount of predator control will restore the herd's size to it's one-time, record level.
More:
https://humanesociety.org/blog/alaska-officials-killing-grizzly-bears
Stand Against Slaughter of Alaska's Brown Bears
https://change.org/p/stand-against-slaughter-of-alaska-s-brown-bears
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