Any time 1 group feels that "their" time/target is going to be infringed upon, there will be push back from them. It sucks that it divides the small population of us that enjoy the outdoors the way we do.

This does a great job of summarizing why I want to see bear trapping in zone C. I see it year in and year out: the current bear hunt in zone C isn't working.

Those bob cat tag holders SELL their tags to the hound hunters so It's a win win situation.

Yes we should be able to have the same opportunity to harvest a bear with traps as the hound hunter. The WI Bear hunters helped us when we were introducing CRs. But we weren't competing for the bear tags.

Mike Schmeling (SP) was the fore runner on this bear trapping with foot snares. But I don't know how to get a hold of him.

Maine has a bear baiting, hound hunting and bear trapping season, they all overlap at some point during the season. I've hunted/taken my fair share of bear but I've never been enticed to trap for them. I didn't want the rodeo of trying to release a sow accompanied with cubs or a cub accompanied with a sow. There is no prohibition of taking either here in Maine.

So you guys want fairness? I would make a biological case.

I don't know Mike S.

1 more comment about hound hunters wanting to hunt fisher is that fisher can't legally he dispatched with a gun. So even if their dogs treed 1, ya can't shoot a fisher. Even if we get a fisher in a foothold, going up and shooting it would be illegal even for a trapper.

Come to zone C and you will see a biological case. The current method isn't working. Marshrats comment is my thought too, as far as what it's like with problem bear in zone C.

Is the zone C bear problems because of access to private lands? Or are they not issuing enough permits?

I see only 62.3% of zone C applicants with 1 point drew for 2019 season. (9983 apps-6310 draw)
If it’s that much of a problem? Shouldn’t the number of tags be much higher?

The problem is not that they aren't issuing enough permits.

There's major competition among bear baiters in zone C. They're so often pulling bears away from each other, and then in many cases they all walk away unsuccesful. More tags is absolutely not the answer in zone C, and DNR knows that.

Benefit for trappers in allowing fisher hunting....we can simplify and eliminate another useless rule! Wonder how many folks got in trouble with that rule because they overlooked it.

Yeah, that's an interesting point MarshRat.


Hey guys, no one ever said this stuff is easy

I was surprised to see the amount of private land in Zone C... looks like a good place to launch.

I also saw that Bear Trapping became illegal in Wisconsin in 1957... The Beav might be holding out on us- He probably was a scrappy 17 then and participated.

Yes, interesting info.

Maybe they could legalize it only on zone C private land if that's what folks would go for
I'm not opposed to a compromise. I'm going into this open minded, that's part of the reason I started this thread.

And just for the record: to my knowledge, WTA , FTA, and NTA don't have a formal position on this.

Yeah. DNR would much rather have a newbie trapper beating their fisher to death.

Beav; You can’t lump all of the Wi. Bear Hunters as hounds men. Some prefer to sit in a tree over a little garbage dump. Just like not all WTA members trap the same way. I.e. Some don’t use CRs or some don’t use colony traps, or some only trap certain furbearers.

Dr Drake of the UW Madison Urban Canid Project is going to start using foot activated CRs around Madison. That should provide good (and interesting) data. Beav probably knows all about it.

Ha,maybe they'll be more receptive to this idea than the Michigan Bear Hunters are.

I'm in the know but so far haven't participated.

That Is very true but Your still competing for kill tags one way or the other. And of coarse some bear hunters are trappers. And some permit holders will offer up their tags to the hound men to get better odds on filling that tag. But dead Is dead.

I wish you luck if WI is anything like MN. Some friends of mine who run coyotes have been trying to get MN to allow bear hunting with hounds for years now. Of course, the ARs have pointed out the cruelty involved and it has never gotten anywhere.