Tagged: hunters

The National Park Service and the Game and Fish Department changed regulations for hunting elk in Grand Teton National Park. Part of the reason for these changes is to avoid contact between hunters and grizzly bears.

Last year a hunter participating in the annual elk reduction program shot and killed a grizzly in the park. In 2011, a grizzly mauled a hunter. Both encounters involved bears protecting animal carcasses.

The Wyoming Department of Game and Fish wants hunters to properly dispose of animal carcasses in landfills and not in the wild.

A Wyoming man was bitten by a weak, old grizzly bear while hunting near Cody last week.

Denny Hammer of the local Game and Fish office says the bear was unable to hunt and had dragged discarded carcasses to a dense area of willows where it made a day bed. The hunter surprised it when he passed, and the bear bit his leg. The man remained hospitalized for two days. Hammer says Game and Fish trapped and euthanized the bear.