The biannual BEaR meeting will be held at the Mississippi Museum of Natural Science in Jackson from 1:00 - 4:30 pm. There was a lot of bear capture activity and a documentary completed since the Spring, so please join us for updates and information!

Click here for more information.

The Spring BEaR meeting moves to the Delta region this year and includes an agenda packed with a lot of interesting updates and presentations from bear researchers in Mississippi and Louisiana. Please join us!

Click here for more information.

While Darryl Eubanks of Lucedale, Mississippi was deer hunting in 2007, he killed a Louisiana black bear, a species listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act, and protected by the State of Mississippi as a rare and threatened animal.

On Dec. 22, 2008, U.S. District Court Judge Keith Starrett, Southern District, Hattiesburg Federal District Court, sentenced Darryl Eubanks to 30 days in jail, a $5,000 fine, and $10,000 restitution payable to the BEaR Group of Mississippi. In addition, Eubanks is prohibited from hunting during one year of supervised release probation. He will also pay a $50 special assessment fee and perform 50 hours of community service at a wildlife refuge. Eubanks began serving his jail time on Jan. 6, 2009.

Click here to read the full press release by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

The 7th annual Great Delta Bear Affair (GDBA) was held on October 25 and attracted over 6,000 people to the quaint Mississippi delta town of Rolling Fork.  In addition to raising awareness about black bears in the state, it also commemorated Theodore Roosevelt’s sesquicentennial birthday and themed the event “Bearing it all for 150 years – the legacy and the legend.”

For more on the 2008 GDBA, click here.

The festival included a dedication of the new Theodore Roosevelt National Wildlife Refuge, a youth education day and Friday night fundraiser, the Wildlife Olympics competition for high school teams, a horse-trail ride, the long-distance black bear bicycle ride, a 5K run/walk, tours of prehistoric Indian mounds, live music all day long, arts and crafts, educational seminars, storytelling, children’s amusements, food, food, food, and an incredible fireworks display to conclude one of the best fun-filled family days in the South.

Darryl Eubanks of George County in southeastern Mississippi was arrested June 3rd on federal charges accusing him of killing a Louisiana black bear, the U.S. Attorney's Office said. He also was charged in a four-count indictment handed down in May with the illegal transportation of a black bear, obstruction of justice for allegedly tampering with a witness and providing false statements to federal investigators.

Eubanks is accused of "knowingly and unlawfully" shooting and killing the bear in January 2008. The animal's carcass was found dumped in Perry County. The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service for Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi and the state Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks jointly investigated the killing.

U.S. Attorney Dunn Lampton commended state and federal wildlife agents involved in the investigation. "This is yet another example of teamwork by federal and state agents," Lampton said. "It is important to all of us to protect endangered and threatened species, and our office will vigorously prosecute those who illegally kill black bears or any other protected species." Added USFWS's Robert T. Oliveri: "Anyone involved in the illegal killing of black bears protected by the Endangered Species Act will be vigorously pursued by state and federal agents."

The trial has been set for Aug. 18 in U.S. District Court in Hattiesburg. If convicted of all the charges, Eubanks could go to prison for up to 12 years and pay fines of up to $250,000.

In the Spring of 2008, one healthy female cub was born high in a hollow tree on Delta National Forest.  Her mother was first radio collared in Arkansas and made the trek to Mississippi sometime last year.  When MDWFP's bear biologist Brad Young climbed the tree to tranquilize the female and put a new satellite tracking collar on her, he unexpectedly discovered she had the single cub. The cub was weighed, measured and marked for future identification before being placed safely back with mother bear in the tree.

This makes the second documented litter born in the Delta in over 40 years.

Starting November 2007, some roads in Mississippi will have signs posted to tell drivers to be bear-aware.  BEaR, MDWFP, and the Mississippi Department of Transportation collaborated to acquire and set up the signs in areas where bears were most frequently sighted, and thus more likely to cross busy roadways.

The signs serve to both alert and educate people in Mississippi about bears.

For more information, click here

to see the December 11, 2007,

article in The Vicksburg Post.