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Sunshine, slight chance of showers expected as the new week begins

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Outdoors with Tom Venesky: An encounter with the boss of the fall woods

<p>Focus on the food.</p><p>That&#8217;s the message from Pennsylvania Game Commission biologist Kevin Wenner for hunters who will be heading out for Monday&#8217;s start of the archery bear season. And it&#8217;s advice that will likely stick for the opening day of the regular bear season on Nov. 19.</p><p>While mast crops such as acorns and hickory nuts fluctuate in availability throughout the region, Wenner said they appear to be in strong supply. Also, there&#8217;s plenty of standing corn yet to be harvested that will attract bears as well.</p><p>Those locations should also attract hunters, he said.</p><p>&#8220;Right now bears are active for one reason - to put on weight before they enter their dens for the winter,&#8221; Wenner said. &#8220;If there&#8217;s a natural food source available, that&#8217;s where you should focus your efforts.&#8221;</p><p>Abundant food sources also mean that bears will remain active for a longer period. Bears don&#8217;t enter their dens when the weather turns cold, Wenner said, but rather when food supplies dwindle and they expend more energy searching for food than what they gain.</p><p>While food sources are readily available, what about the number of bears?</p><p>Wenner said they&#8217;re in good supply as well.</p><p>Based on nuisance complaints, highway kills and the number of bears caught for research purposes, Wenner said the bruin population in the northeast is high.</p><p>This year PGC staff caught nearly 400 bears in the northeast region, far more than the annual average of 300.</p><p>&#8220;That&#8217;s a lot of bears for one year,&#8221; Wenner said. &#8220;The bear hunting opportunities here just keep getting better.&#8221;</p><p>Archery hunters will have the first chance to harvest a bear during the five-day season that runs from Nov. 14-18. The season was implemented in 2006 to afford hunters additional opportunity and with the hope of harvesting bears responsible for nuisance complaints in suburban areas, considering the safety zone for archers is 50 yards.</p><p>Wenner said nuisance complaints really haven&#8217;t decreased since the archery bear season was implemented, but there has been discussion about expanding the season to overlap the second to last week of the archery deer season.</p><p>&#8220;That second to last week is being discussed because we want to avoid the peak of the rut when the majority of archery hunters are focused on deer,&#8221; Wenner said. &#8220;Also, there should be plenty of standing corn at that time and that&#8217;s where many archery bear hunters are successful.&#8221;</p><p>Last year, 209 bears were taken statewide during the archery season, compared to 3,527 harvested during the regular and extended seasons. Wenner said the archery harvest is &#8220;supplemental&#8221; to the regular and extended seasons, but overlapping the season with a week of archery deer could increase hunting pressure and harvest.</p><p>One factor that both archery and rifle hunters can look forward to is an opportunity to not only harvest a bear, but a big one as well. Last season, 68 bears weighing 500 pounds or more were harvested by hunters, including 18 that exceeded 600 pounds.</p><p>Wenner said Wildlife Conservation Officers handled several bears this summer in the 500 to 600-pound range, and they could potentially weigh up to 800 pounds this fall.</p><p>Big bears and high numbers combine to make every season eventful, and there&#8217;s enough habitat in Pennsylvania to allow the bear population to expand from the current estimated population of 18,000.</p><p>But that&#8217;s not something Wenner would like to see in the northeast.</p><p>&#8220;The carrying capacity of the habitat hasn&#8217;t been reached, but from a social capacity we&#8217;re there. We&#8217;d like to see the bear population decrease due to the amount of conflict with people,&#8221; Wenner said. &#8220;That conflict isn&#8217;t a result of aggressive behavior by bears, but poor choices made by people.&#8221;</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">Paul S. Mahon, of Montoursville, poses with the 561-pound male bear he harvested in Plunketts Creek Township, Lycoming County, Nov. 17, 2015 during the statewide archery bear season. Mahon is one of 68 Pennsylvania hunters to harvest a bear weighing more than 500 pounds last year. The 2015 statewide harvest of 3,748 bears ranks as Pennsylvania&#8217;s third largest. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/web1_Bear-season.jpg</photo0><caption0>Paul S. Mahon, of Montoursville, poses with the 561-pound male bear he harvested in Plunketts Creek Township, Lycoming County, Nov. 17, 2015 during the statewide archery bear season. Mahon is one of 68 Pennsylvania hunters to harvest a bear weighing more than 500 pounds last year. The 2015 statewide harvest of 3,748 bears ranks as Pennsylvania&#8217;s third largest. </caption0><photoCredit0>Submitted photo </photoCredit0></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/web1_bear.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Hunters will have plenty of opportunities to harvest a bear over the next two weeks. The five-day archery bear season opens on Nov. 14, followed by the statewide regular season on Nov. 19. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo1>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/web1_bear.jpg</photo1><caption1>Hunters will have plenty of opportunities to harvest a bear over the next two weeks. The five-day archery bear season opens on Nov. 14, followed by the statewide regular season on Nov. 19. </caption1><photoCredit1>Submitted photo </photoCredit1></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Tom Venesky</p><p>tvenesky@www.timesleader.com</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><factboxMeta><p><strong>Baiting for bears? </strong></p><p>The use of bait for hunting is not legal in Pennsylvania, but other states do allow archery bear hunters to employ the practice as a means to draw the bruins close.</p><p>Pennsylvania Game Commission biologist Kevin Wenner said the use of bait during the bear archery season isn&#8217;t allowed for several reasons. Currently, the PGC allows for 20 percent of the bear population to be harvested. Allowing archery hunters to use bait would increase success rates and create an over-harvest of bears, he said.</p><p>Also, allowing the use of bait during the bear archery season would cause problems for deer season as residue would remain as a possible enticement.</p><p>Wenner said the use of bait in the archery bear season could lead to violations during deer season if hunters are tempted to leave bait out.</p><p>&#8220;It just wouldn&#8217;t work here. In other states where hunting bears over bait is allowed, like Maine, the vegetation is extremely thick and baiting is needed to draw the bears close,&#8221; Wenner said. &#8220;Plus, we have a lot more hunters here and it would increase the success rate, resulting in an over-harvest.&#8221;</p></factboxMeta></div>

Plenty of bears await hunters for archery, rifle seasons