Fund for Animals and PLAN Call on Pennsylvania Game Commission To End Bobcat Hunting and Trapping

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Fund for Animals and PLAN Call on Pennsylvania Game Commission

To End Bobcat Hunting and Trapping

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TO STATE AND ENVIRONMENTAL EDITORS:

Fund for Animals and PLAN Call on Pennsylvania Game Commission

To End Bobcat Hunting and Trapping

HARRISBURG, PENNSYLVANIA, Apr. 9 -/E-Wire/-- Today, the Pennsylvania Game Commission (PGC) will hear public testimony on renewing the controversial sport hunting and trapping season on bobcats, which began last year after a thirty-year moratorium and amid overwhelming public outcry. The Fund for Animals and the Pennsylvania Legislative Action Network (PLAN) will testify at today's hearing, asking the commissioners to stop this cruel and biologically reckless experiment from occurring again next year.

The PGC estimates that 58 bobcats were killed last season, most of them in cruel steel-jawed leghold traps. Media reports indicate that the PGC may issue between 800 and 1,000 bobcat permits for the next hunting and trapping season.

Experts have criticized the PGC's bobcat management plan as being flawed and inadequate, stating that the agency has too little data on Pennsylvania's bobcat population to justify a sport hunting and trapping season. Dr. Seth Riley, a nationally renowned bobcat expert and wildlife ecologist for the National Park Service, issued an independent critique of the bobcat management plan before the hunting and trapping season began last fall, calling it a "mistake."

Heidi Prescott, national director of The Fund for Animals, who is testifying at today's hearing, stated, "Even hunters and outdoor writers in Pennsylvania have criticized the PGC for opening a bobcat season and diminishing the agency's public image in the eyes of Pennsylvania citizens. Science and public opinion both dictate that the PGC should stop circling ranks and should return bobcats to the protected status they held for thirty years."

The Fund for Animals and several other plaintiffs have filed a lawsuit against the PGC for the implementation of the bobcat hunting and trapping season, and the case is currently pending. State Representative Gaynor Cawley has also introduced a bill, HB 560, to place a three-year moratorium on the hunting and trapping of bobcats.

A copy of The Fund for Animals' testimony is available by calling [REDACTED-PHONE] ext. 213.

Heidi Prescott of the Fund for Animals, [REDACTED-PHONE], ext. 213

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