Game and Fish reduces allowable female grizzly kills to one

JACKSON (WNE) — State wildlife managers have halved the number of female grizzly bears that hunters could target this fall, a change that means hunters will be limited to one-at-a-time access in the core of the species’ range in Wyoming.

The Wyoming Game and Fish Department announced Thursday that it downsized its female grizzly hunt quota from two bears to one during the 2018 season. It’s a significant change because it means the grizzly hunt in much of the Yellowstone region will now be shut down after a single sow is killed. The reduction came after a debate over whether Wyoming rightly “rounded up” its 1.45-bear share of the female grizzlies that can be legally hunted in the tristate Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.

Game and Fish Chief Game Warden Brian Nesvik said the change is not a concession that Wyoming erred, but was rather made out of caution.

“It seemed like a conservative approach and the right thing to do,” Nesvik said.

Montana and Idaho officials agreed during a winter meeting that Wyoming could hunt two female grizzlies, he said.

“We all agreed at that meeting ... that we would start with two female bears,” Nesvik said. “And that hasn’t changed. We still believe that is the agreement and that is the authority that exists.”

Outside an ecosystem-interior “demographic monitoring area,” Wyoming has more leeway over its grizzly hunt, and there is no separate cap on the number of female grizzlies. A total of 12 grizzlies could be killed in the outskirts area, known as hunt zone 7, this fall, and, technically, all could be grizzly sows.