LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) - A bill that would repeal Nebraska’s mountain lion hunting season drew mixed response at a legislative hearing.
The bill, introduced by Sen. Ernie Chambers of Omaha, was heard Wednesday by the Natural Resources Committee.
Mountain lions are native to Nebraska, but vanished in the late 1800s after settlers started poisoning and hunting them.
In 2012, the Legislature passed a law that allowed the Games and Parks Commission to issue mountain lion hunting permits. There are four hunting areas in the state, and the commission determines which areas can sustain hunting each season. In the 2014 season, which is broken into two parts, permit holders can hunt in the Pine Ridge area in the northern panhandle and the Prairie area.
An unlimited number of permits are available for the Prairie area for the 2014 season. In the Pine Ridge area, where officials estimate 22 mountain lions live, 102 total permits were issued, 100 of which were for the second part of the season.
Chambers said that when so many permits are issued, it’s not about hunting, it’s about eradication.
“I will do all I can to prevent the extermination of a species of any animal in this state,” Chambers said.
The Pine Ridge season is split in two, Jan. 1 to Feb. 14 and Feb. 15 to March 31, and both parts end after two males or one female are killed. Two males were killed earlier this month to end the first part of the season.
Wednesday’s testimony focused mostly on the Pine Ridge area, which one opponent said may see mountain lions from neighboring Wyoming and South Dakota.
Opponents of the bill also said that the Game and Parks Commission should be able to have the tools to manage the mountain lion population. The commission director, Jim Douglas, has adopted guidelines that mountain lions are a component of Nebraska’s biodiversity that should be maintained, he said.
But supporters of the bill expressed fear that mountain lion could be eradicated.
Dana Hirschbach of Hartington, whose family lives on a ranch, described her experience with mountain lions, saying the danger to people is exaggerated because the animals avoid people.
“I have seen a mountain lion, close up,” she said. “I did not fear for my life.”
Stacy Swinney, a Dawes County Commissioner, testified that the state has a “serious mountain lion problem.” Because the Pine Ridge area was affected by a forest fire in 2010, wildlife has moved closer to the homes that were saved from the fire, he said.
“We now have a growing, reproducing number of one of nature’s most fearless, dangerous predators, and they walk through our homesteads at will day or night,” Swinney said, adding about the mountain lions. “We live with them, let’s make them afraid of us.”
Scott Smathers, executive director of the Nebraska Sportsmen’s Foundation, said that the commission should do what it does best: manage and regulate game species in the state.
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The bill is LB671.
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