Look out Yogi and Smokey…

Instead of trying to curb the influx of people flocking to Florida, the FWC decided that bears need to die.

Florida’s FWC approved a bear hunt for the first time in a decade at its last meeting, despite public outcry. / CONTRIBUTED

Let me start off by saying I am not anti-hunting. I am, in-fact, both pro-gun and pro-hunting.

But I draw the line at assault weapons and charismatic megafauna.

And that is exactly what Florida’s black bears are.

I was involved in this discussion the last time it came around.

To say it went over like a loud, wet fart in church would be putting it mildly.

It is equally as repugnant this time.

A Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission that is stacked with developers and has only one member with a science- and wildlife-based background, has decided bears must die for the greater good.

“Hunting is the tool most commonly used to manage bear populations in states that have healthy populations,” George Warthen, the state’s conservation chief, said during FWC’s most recent meeting in Havana, Florida, in Gadsden County north of Tallahassee on the state’s panhandle.

A Florida black bear is caught in a photo trap along Florida’s Wildlife Corridor. Encroaching development is threatening black bears and other native Florida wildlife.Florida’s answer? Kill the bears. /CONTRIBUTED

And yet, there were never really any answers to the impact of the hunt in 2015, and the harvest of black bears has not been allowed since.

But that changed at the last FWC meeting as commissioners approved a hunt for December, 2025.

Maybe instead of opening season on bears (during the last hunt, several mothers were killed, orphaning cubs, leaving them fend for themselves) the state should regulate the most dangerous game: Humans.

Florida’s last bear hunt occurred over a decade ago. Several mother bears were killed, orphaning their cubs and leaving them to fend for themselves. / WBIR

Year after year, more and more people move to Florida, mowing down pinelands and filling in cypress swamps, building McMansions and developments like The Villages.

The people inhabiting these matchstick fortresses have absolutely no interest in contributing to the place they have decided to call home.

Rampant overdevelopment in Central and North Florida is encroaching on the black bear’s native habitat. The State of Florida’s answer? Kill the bears. / CONTRIBUTED

They don’t want to pay property taxes.

They don’t want to fund education.

They could care less about wild Florida and its unique ecosystems.

Black bears are every bit of a nuisance as mosquitos, love bugs and no sedums to them.

In the words of my friend and fellow eco-steward, Steve Kantner, “They will slay everything incapable of carrying a wallet, and pave over the last green thing.”

I live in place now where it is not uncommon to see a black bear mom and her cubs walking down Main Street at dusk, looking for the next dumpster that isn’t locked.

They’re not bothering anybody, and the fact that an idiot woman in Southwest Florida was killed by a black bear isn’t a reason to start blasting Yogi and Smokey.

I think the only dumber way to die would be by nurse shark.

It is hard to comprehend how people put themselves in these positions to get attacked by wildlife that has been just about completely beaten into submission.

Maybe we should start looking at the iconic whitetail deer’s diminutive offshoot, the Key deer.

There are too many of them, and they are walking through peoples’ back yards and eating garbage, making a mess.

But ultimately, the state’s wildlife agency and the developers on the commission decided rather than try to curb rampant development the answer was to kill bears.

To help oppose the bear hunt, although it is likely a fait complete at this point, let the FWC know how you feel.

Only you can help prevent the Florida bear hunt.

I am not really sure why we can’t get along with our wildlife.

But as long developers continue in control of Florida’s Fish and Wildlife Commission, not even Yogi and Smokey the bear — or their cubs — are safe.