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Protect the Tradition of Hunting with Dogs; Stop Giving Bear Poachers an Excuse.
You can take action on this alert by reading the information below and following the
directions at the bottom.
Let’s preserve both hunting bears with dogs and training dogs where it is both legal and appropriate. If you hunt, hunt with dogs, train dogs or support legal hunting with dogs, send this message in support of SB 474.
The Camo Coalition has been at the forefront of defending our right to hunt with dogs. In recent years, GWF/Camo Coalition staff were instrumental in defeating attempts by animal rights groups to restrict the use of dogs while hunting. Hunting dogs are as much a part of our outdoor sports and traditional family fabric as high school football on Friday night and rooting for the Dawgs on Saturday. There are some bad actors, however, who are giving all hunters a bad name and tarnishing our public image.
Some of us have pointers for quail and grouse, others have retrievers for ducks and dove, some have remarkable squirrel fiest and some have tracking dogs for coon hunting, rabbits, deer, bear and wild hogs. While hunting with dogs is a widely accepted practice, the time tested tradition of hunting deer with dogs remains in only 33 counties, primarily in SE Georgia as thick habitat lends itself to the chase. It is still legal to hunt bears with dogs in five counties near the Okefenokee Swamp; Brantley, Charlton, Clinch, Echols and Ware.
As hunters, we want to protect these traditions and, in this case, the legal hunting of bears with dogs. With this tradition comes the responsibility of preserving a viable and huntable population of black bears across all of Georgia. This requires maintaining friendly relationships and a good reputation with our neighbors and the non-hunting public.
However, there are some who are making this very difficult for us. Because there is virtually no training season in North Carolina and Tennessee these out-of-state dog trainers are running bears in North Georgia nearly year round, including deer and turkey season. In doing so, they disregard private property allowing their dogs to trespass and sometimes pursue their dogs onto private property without permission. Additionally, these folks are running bears with dogs during the turkey and deer seasons disrupting the hunts of other sportsmen. These conflicts are generating complaints and creating discord between landowners and the hunting community. Furthermore, eye witness accounts of dog-bear hunters illegally killing bear in North Georgia further degrades the reputation of those of us who hunt bears legally.
These disrespectful nonresidents are using Georgia as their training ground almost 290 days of the year. It seems prudent to stop the abuse of our resources and protect private property rights. The goal of this action alert is to maintain our ability to train bear dogs where bear hunting with dogs is legal and stop running bears with dogs in North Georgia where hunting bears with dogs is illegal.
Let’s preserve both hunting bears with dogs and training dogs where it is both legal and appropriate. If you hunt, hunt with dogs, train dogs or support legal hunting with dogs, send this message in support of SB 474 as passed by the Senate Natural Resources Committee.
Your message will be sent to each of the following targets:
Your State Representative
Your State Senator
A sample message appears below, which you may edit before sending.
Please vote for SB 474 as unanimously passed by the Senate Natural Resources Committee!
Dear Representative,
As a Georgia Sportsman I support the tradition of hunting game with dogs and the responsibility to respect private property rights. Sportsmen have relied on their K-9 companions to accompany them on hunts for numerous species of game birds, rabbits, squirrels, deer, bear and wild hogs. We intend to see these traditions continued across Georgia.
To curtail the negative social and biological impacts of people running bears with dogs nearly year round in North Georgia, we need to at least maintain our hunting traditions by allowing bear-dog training only where an open season allowing the use of dogs exists. It is not legal to hunt bear with dogs in the mountains of North Georgia. We support and want to preserve the tradition of both training and hunting bears with dogs where it is both legal and appropriate.
Please vote for SB 474 as unanimously passed by the Senate Natural Resources Committee!
Sincerely, Your name and address here
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This Action Alert Campaign is Closed.
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