Judge rules that Florida's bear hunt will go on next month

Stephen Hudak, Orlando Sentinel on Nov 24, 2025

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A judge in Tallahassee rejected today a plea from a Central Florida bear advocacy group to halt the state’s planned bear hunt.

Circuit Judge Angela Dempsey ruled against Bear Warriors United after more than two hours of testimony and arguments from the Seminole County group’s lawyer, Thomas Crapps, and lawyers for the Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission and Safari Club International, a pro-hunting organization that was allowed to make arguments for the state’s first bear hunt in a decade.

The judge said a temporary injunction was an “extraordinary and drastic remedy.”

She said foes of the hunt, set for Dec. 6 through Dec. 28 in four specially designated hunting zones, had not proved their argument that the bear harvest — a term FWC uses for the hunt — would cause irreparable harm to the once-threatened species.

Dempsey noted the hunt is more limited than the October 2015 hunt in which hunters killed 304 bears in just two days.

The wildlife agency crafted rules designed to take female bears out of hunters’ crosshairs by setting the season in December when female bears tend to limit their range and begin denning with cubs for the winter, , said Mike Orlando FWC’s bear expert.

He said female bears are more critical for the sustainability of the species.

Unlike 2015, the upcoming hunt is limited to 172 hunters who won a permit through a lottery system.

A permit allows the holder to kill one bear.

Bear Warriors United argued that FWC relied on “outdated and obsolete data” to authorize a hunt.

“Their decision was not based on sound science, it’s political,” Crapps said of the wildlife commissioners.

Orlando said the hunt is intended to slow the species’ growth. FWC estimates about 4,000 bears roam the state.

Karina Shadix, founder of Bear Warriors United, was distraught over the judge’s ruling.

“I’m just devastated that 172 innocent souls will lose their life and that so many people will take pleasure in killing,” she said, replying by text. “The FWC’s own science proves that bear populations are declining. Loss of habitat, vehicle strikes and poaching are causing real threats of extinction. A trophy hunt will be the final nail in the bears’ coffin.”

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