The bear-baiting referendum questions gives voters two choices. Vote "yes" if you want to ban hunting bear by baiting, trapping and dogs. Vote "no" if you want to keep things as they are.Too bad there isn't a third choice on the ballot: "Not appropriate for a plebiscite."
This is a ridiculous topic for a public vote. The manner and method of hunting ought to be left to the state Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife and, if that fails, the Legislature. The Legislature has not seen fit to bring the bear hunting issue to a vote, and the department stands by it's current rules covering bear hunting as the best way to control the bear populations while preserving the rights of hunters.
That's good enough for us and, because there is no way to vote "not appropriate," we endorse voting "no" on this question.
Where does all the fuss come from?
It comes from people -- many of them Mainers who signed the ballot petition -- who think these forms of bear hunting are 1. cruel and 2. unsporting.
Baiting involves leaving tasty treats for the bear, lying in wait until a bear shows up, and then shooting it. While this sounds easy, some experts say it isn't and results in only one of four hunters killing a bear.
Trapping is self-explanatory, but, obviously, it is painful to the bear. The third method is chasing the bear with hounds and then shooting it. That's got to be pretty bad for the bear, too.
Yet, how the proponents of this referendum determine these hunting methods are cruel is purely a matter or guesswork, subjectivity and emotion.
Cruel, according to the biggest dictionary we have around, "implies both a disposition to harm and satisfaction in or indifference to suffering."
Cruel, according to the biggest dictionary we have around, "implies both a disposition to harm and satisfaction in or indifference to suffering."
We don't think bear hunters want bears to suffer; they only want to kill them, the cleaner the kill the better. Perhaps a few heartless hunters enjoy the suffering or just don't care about it, but that's not the norm. Most hunters respect their prey.
As for whether baiting, trapping and hunting with dogs is unsporting, that, too, is debatable. The fact that many more bears survive the hunt than are killed suggests that the hunters don't have a terribly great advantage. (The bear population in the state is about 23,000, of which less than 4,000 are typically killed each year in the hunt.)
The opponents of the referendum have not focused much on the proponents' main arguments, but instead have stressed the need to control the bear population so that bear-to-human interactions are minimized and the strength of the bear-hunting economy is maintained.
While the referendum would, if passed, allow for taking nuisance bears with bait, state biologists say the current hunting season works best.
Clearly, bear-hunting provides income and jobs in the Maine woods. Opponents of baiting say hunters could still come to Maine to stalk and shoot bear. Maybe they would, but neither side knows for certain what would happen to the spending, most of which comes from out-of-state hunters.
In the end, the words of Gov. John Baldacci are the best we've heard on the issue:
"The Department's biologists have been studying Maine's bear population for more than two decades ... We know the bear population is increasing in Maine. These scientists know best how to care for and manage the bear population, and a limited hunting season for bear is one of those tools."
MAINEJOBS
