The Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife website reports: “Maine experiences relatively few bear conflicts (about 500 a year) compared to other states with no bear hunting or those that have lost different bear hunting methods to referendum.”

If you talk to wildlife officials in most other states, such as Washington, Oregon and Colorado, bear complaints are holding steady and bear populations are manageable. Baiting is allowed in only 12 states because it is widely believed that baiting habituates bears to human food, increasing human-bear conflicts.

Only Massachusetts, New Jersey and New York have experienced an increased number of bear complaints in recent years, because of their high human population-to-bear ratio.

The IFW points to Maine’s increasing bear population by 30 percent as “proof” that Maine’s three methods of hunting – hounding, baiting and trapping – are working.

But the Wildlife Alliance of Maine points out that baiting increases the bear population for another reason: A high-fat diet increases the levels of circulating estrogen in human females and bears, increasing their fertility and reproduction rate, and the high-fat, sugary supplemental feeding program increases bear and cub survival rates.

Vae Philbrick

Scarborough