In 1992 the Louisiana black bear was placed on the endangered species list.
Thanks to conservation and restoration efforts, the state mammal was removed from that list. Now, after more than 35 years, black bear hunting season was able to return to the sportsman’s paradise.
Deron Santiny is one of 10 hunters to have harvested a bear in the 2024 season.
“He just looked like a Volkswagen Beetle coming out of the woods. i mean it was just that big. So i waited, I let him take a step forward with his right front paw, and when he took that step I just shot him behind the shoulder because I knew the bone was out the way, and he just fell right there,” Santiny said.
He wants to make sure people know that these hunters aren’t just in it for the thrill of the kill.
“Yeah it is a sport, however the meat has been processed and has been eaten, and is being eaten and is being shared.”
John Hanks from the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries helped spearhead the revival of black bear hunting in Louisiana. He says just because bear populations are healthy doesn’t mean their work is done.
“It was delisted in 2016, but we continued all this recovery, we didn’t stop doing it. We’re still doing hair samples, we did one last year, we’re going to do one this year. Also during the recovery efforts and still now, we collar female bears and we go visit them in the den to see if they had cubs, how many cubs did they have, what sex are the cubs,” Hanks said.
And while some may find the sport controversial, hanks looks at the bigger picture.
“You know people ask me all the time, was it a success? the success was having a hunt. we hunted an animal that was on the endangered species list. so just to have a hunt, whether we killed one or not, was a success,” he said.
Thankfully now, the future of the Louisiana black bear, and the hunting season, looks bright.
LDWF urges people to visit bearwise.org to learn more about bears, what to do if approached by a bear, how to keep them away from campsites and much more.