FAIRBANKS - Interior hunters won't have to spend $25 on a brown bear tag this season.
The Alaska Board of Game on Monday voted to eliminate brown bear tag fees in all Interior region game management units.
The game board is holding a 10-day meeting at the Westmark Hotel in Fairbanks. After two days of hearing public testimony, the board began debating and voting on more than 130 proposals submitted to change hunting and trapping regulations in the Interior.
Eliminating grizzly tag fees will cost the Alaska Department of Fish and Game about $45,000 but should give Interior hunters a chance to tap into what state wildlife officials say is healthy Interior grizzly bear population.
"This is not widespread predator control in Region III, I can see where people would look at it like that," board member Ted Spraker of Soldotna said. "All we're doing is providing additional opportunity."
The game board eliminated tag fees in game management units 12, 19, 20, 21, 24, 25, 26B and 26C.
Grizzly tag fees in several Interior units have been eliminated in recent years and harvest in those units showed only a slight increase, state wildlife biologist Doreen Parker-McNeil with the Department of Fish and Game told the board.
Most grizzly bears in the Interior are taken incidental to other hunts, and having no tag fee will allow all hunters to shoot a grizzly if they see one.
"It's not a revenue generator," board chairman Cliff Judkins said of the tag fees. "This is meant to increase opportunity if critters are available."
In addition to getting rid of grizzly bear tag fees in Interior hunting units, the board also voted to:
- Allow registered guide-outfitters to register up to 10 black bear bait stations at a time in units 12, 19, 20, 21, 24 and 25, as long as they are established and maintained by the guide-outfitter, licensed class-A assistant guides or assistant guides. The guide-outfitter must have a signed guide-client agreement.
- Eliminate black bear sealing requirements in areas where harvest tickets or registration permits are required.
- Allow black bear hunters in unit 20 the option of salvaging the hide or meat or both from June 1 to Dec. 31.
The board rejected a proposal that would have established an earlier season for resident Dall sheep hunters than nonresident hunters in the Interior by one week, as well as a proposal to open black bear baiting season in units 12, 19, 20, 21, 24 and 25 two to three weeks earlier.
Opening the sheep season a week earlier for residents than nonresidents in the Interior would create an influx of hunters, board members agreed.
"I think it would put a lot more pressure on the mountain," Judkins said.
