First it was coyotes and now it’s the bears. New Jersey officials are spending more and more time dealing with coyote attacks on kids and pets and now chasing bears out of homes and up trees before killing them.
Officials yesterday responded to complaints of bears in homes in three different locations. Two incidents involved mother bears with cubs and both resulted in the shooting of the mother bear and retrieval of the cubs destined for what officials say is rehabilitation before being released back to the wild.
It is easy to say that New Jersey is getting just what they deserve in having difficulty dealing with overgrown populations of wildlife, like bear and coyotes. Last year under orders of Gov. Corzine, DEP chief Liza Jackson discarded a court approved bear management plan and put a halt to bear hunting saying that nonlethal means should be examined further first. I fail to see how slaughtering mother bears up a tree in neighborhoods is a better and nonlethal method of dealing with bears.
From the moment Jackson and Corzine announced their illegal activities to ignore a court approved plan, they have shown nothing but ineptitude in dealing with wildlife problems, the nonlethal way. Nothing they have done has succeeded and officials are spending all their time and taxpayers dollars killing animals. This makes no sense and is total foolishness.
If sensibility isn’t restored back into the DEP’s management of its wildlife, this problem will only continue to grow and present further challenges and troubles for the residents of New Jersey.
Tom Remington
