Uphold ban on polar bear hides, animal rights groups say
Published Wednesday, June 25, 2008
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Stumble It!ANCHORAGE -- Environmental and animal rights groups have lined up to oppose a lawsuit that seeks to let American sport hunters again import hides of polar bears shot legally in Canada.
Safari Club International wants to overturn a ban put in place last month when U.S. Department of Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne declared polar bears a threatened species.
Politicians from Canada's Northwest Territory this week made the same request to Interior Department officials in Washington, D.C.
Opponents say sport hunting adds stress to polar bears already menaced by a loss of sea ice, their main habitat.
"Until we take steps to address global warming, we need to do all we can to relieve further threats that are accelerating the bears' downward spiral, including the trophy hunting of polar bears in Canada," said Rodger Schlickeisen, president of Defenders of Wildlife.
Kempthorne on May 15 declared polar bears threatened, or likely to become endangered within the foreseeable future, because of habitat loss.
Trophy hunting of U.S. bears in Alaska has been banned since 1972. Bears killed by subsistence hunters are not considered a threat.
Kempthorne, however, declared polar bears threatened throughout their range and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service withdrew authorization to import hides from animals killed in approved populations in Canada — including animals already killed and awaiting a taxidermist mount.
Importation was allowed through an amendment to the Marine Mammal Protection Act passed by Congress in 1994.
Safari Club International on May 23 filed a required 60-day notice of its intent to sue to overturn the ban, not just for bears already killed but also on behalf of members who hope to hunt in the future, including those who booked and paid for hunts in 2009 and 2010.
Safari Club International attorney Doug Burdin said Wednesday his organization may join the state of Alaska is suing to overturn the listing but so far has only filed to overturn the ban on importing hides.
A listing under the Endangered Species Act does not create an import ban, he said, and the Fish and Wildlife Service did not follow the law in banning hides.
"They never held any kind of rulemaking for designating the polar bear as a depleted species under the Marine Mammal Protection Act," he said.
The ban certainly should not apply to bears killed before May 15, he said.
Safari Club International also argues that sport hunting by U.S. citizens aids bears by supporting Canada's sustainable use harvest programs.
A hunt can cost $40,000 to $50,000 and Safari Club International claims income from hunters helps support polar bear research and provides a direct economic benefit to Canada native communities from supporting and guiding hunts.
"This infusion of cash into the cash-strapped native communities provides another incentive for these people to accept the Western-based science and management that facilitates polar bear conservation and that is required before the Service will approve a population for import," he wrote.
A half-dozen groups want more, not fewer, protections for polar bears and filed to intervene in the lawsuit, including the Center for Biological Diversity, the Natural Resources Defense Council and Greenpeace, which petitioned for the polar bear listing.
The Humane Society of the United States, the International Fund for Animal Welfare and Defenders of Wildlife sought to intervene in a separate filing.
Naomi Rose, senior scientist at the Humane Society of the United States, said the organization opposes killing animals for recreation and fought the 1994 provision for importing bear parts.
The organization also objects based on conservation. Polar bears are difficult to count and their numbers could decline before it's noticed, Rose said.
"Polar bears are a really bad species to kill for recreational purposes," she said. "It's not in their best interest."
The groups point to a U.S. Geological Service study released last year that concluded Alaska's polar bears, and two of the six Canadian polar bear populations from which Americans imported polar bear trophies, could be gone by 2050 because of warming and its effect on sea ice.
Bob McLeod, the Northwest Territory's minister for energy, industry and tourism, said Monday the import ban would effectively wipe out its sports hunting industry.
Community Discussion
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The US Geological study also pointed out that there models for sea melt are far from perfect and leave a wide margin of error.
The studies also mention that nearly all the polar bear populations are either increasing, stable, and few are on a decline that are not outside the normal variations based on past observations.
Does this actually excuse putting undue stress on the remaining polar bear population? There have been several models for Arctic sea ice melt proposed, but none of them refute the fact that these bears are facing an imperiled future. Why hunt them now considering that their species faces possible extinction???
I understand hunters and their need to practice that premevel desire to hunt quarry for sake of survival, social status, sport or possibly all three. It's the very reason why there are so few species of big animals (megafauna) in North and South America. We wiped out most of them before the end of the last ice age after we crossed over the Bering Land Bridge! This kind of behaviour, both good and bad, continues today. It hasn't changed much.
but i'm sure far superior to the rest of us neatherthals and you'll save the day. you'll rescue those polar bears no matter how many native kids in northern canada will have to go hungry.
neanderthals
I find trophy hunting pretty barbaric. I can understand hunting for food and then hey, if you want to mount the head on your wall, go for it. And I certainly understand killing to protect oneself. But to go out and kill an animal just because hey, it's fun to kill. Something is wrong with that. If there are communities that need sustainable economic development, there has to be a better way than this.
polarmark, don't be so presumptuous as to compare yourself and like-minded individuals to neanderthals. I'm sure that whatever hunting they did was for subsistence or self-defense only. I'm sure that they pretty much didn't have time for anything else than survival.
People like you could give a rat's toutie faloutie about Native cultures, except when doing so promotes your own agenda.
Killing a threatened or endangered species for sport is just plain merciless. Why can't you see that? Why won't you acknowledge that? Why won't hunters like you just simply admit to the fact that sometimes it's just plainly wrong to kill? A loaded gun puts ultimate power in your hands, but it certainly doesn't give you the ultimate right, justification, in using it.
LadyNYC, why don't you clean up in your own yard before you move onto someone elses?
Increased and/or stable polar bear populations do not equal imminent extinction, no matter how much hand wringing and phony model making the environmentalist animal rights crowd does.
That being said, I dont favor trophy hunting either.
I don't think natives eat the bear. They say the liver will kill you (vitamin A or something). Maybe used for dog food like most of the Salmon.
When I was in the village it was quite a contest to see which village could kill the most polar bears (for fun). The hides were drug in the house and the women would flesh them in the main room while the men sat around and drank coffee. When the hides were cleaned they were salted, rolled up and thrown in the attic of their government issued housing ...lol. Left to rot.
So ... why can they continue to hunt/kill them and others can not? I don’t think anyone should be allowed to hunt them if they are endangered.
Much to do about nothing...
I like the idea of gloal warming (on the average, fairbanks is roughly 400 ft above sea level). So we might have some new lakes around here. I rather like the Idea of some milder winters in Fairbanks.
If Polar Bear's were the most efficient material, I'd want one...But since their beyond my budget, and better materials are available to keep me warm....I don't really care one way or the other...for those who do....Why not hug together, and start some sort of Poalr Bear farm....and stop trying to force your agenda on the rest of us.
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