Florida set for 2025 Bear hunt (massacre) despite public outcry
- Staci-lee Sherwood
- Jul 7
- 11 min read
Updated: Jul 26
By Staci-lee Sherwood
When one thinks of bears they often think of the fuzzy cubs with the bright curious eyes and funny antics of tree climbing. As sweet as bears look they can be a force of nature, which is how Mother Earth designed it. How Americans came to fall in love with bears is an often misquoted story. In 1902 big game hunter former President Teddy Roosevelt was on a bear hunt with other hunters. They tied a bear to a tree and encouraged Roosevelt to shoot the tied up bear. Roosevelt refused saying that it was unsportsmanlike. News spread quickly shocking many but also planting the seed that shooting tied up animals was an unethical and cruel thing to do. A cartoon soon appeared of the incident followed by a stuffed animal called ‘teddy’s bear’ a.k.a. the teddy bear. That is how most Americans came to learn about bears since few had ever seen one.
The cartoon that started a new way of thinking about bears and hunting
Black Bears in Florida
Unlike the Grizzly or Polar Bears the Black Bear is mostly an herbivore, though classified as omnivores they eat both plants and animals. They sustain themselves more on berries, grasses, nuts, and succulent plants which makes up nearly 80% of their diet. The remainder of their diet comes from insects, larvae, fish, honey, and occasionally carrion. Bears in Florida don’t have as thick a fur or as much fat as bears further north due to the year round heat.
Black bears reproduce slowly and are susceptible to overkill, especially during unregulated hunts. A female reaches breeding age at 4 years and gives birth every 2-3 years depending on available food and habitat which can be depleted by droughts and wildfires along with development. We have all of those in Florida. Her cubs stay with her past the first year. A hunt would surely kill a nursing mom ultimately leaving her cubs orphaned and starving to death. Trophy hunters target breeding adults that disrupt the animals’ social structure and further slow reproduction. This biology negates the myth and lie of overpopulation.
In 2015 it was estimated their population was about 4000 but exact numbers are impossible to get. After working on 3 state permits for FWC for 11 years I personally know how they inflate the numbers and exaggerate to fit their pre planned agenda. So where is the proof of 4000 bears? There is none. Population studies won’t even be completed until 2029. Hunting has never proven to resolve human/bear conflict most of which is caused by humans, sorry but it’s true. Humans that live in bear country often leave their trash out and not ‘bear proof’ and let their pets out unsupervised. I see stories like this all the time. It’s not bears, or any animal, that needs managing but people’s behavior. Education goes a long way and there’s been proof of that. Contrary to media stories designed to get attention and more readers bear attacks are rare.
Black bears as they should be - wild and free
The 2015 bear massacre
In 2014 the Florida Fish Wildlife Commission (FWC) held hearings around the state, which I attended and spoke at, to gauge public opinion on a proposal to hunt bears. Only 1 commissioner opposed the hunt, he no longer sits on the commission, and the hunt went through. What was planned to be a 7 day event ended after 2 days because more bears were killed than planned. In the panhandle 3 times the number of bears allowed were killed. Over 3000 people had hunting permits to kill 300 bears. You do the math. Dead cubs, yearlings and nursing mothers were killed and photographed at checkpoints.
Public disgust spread quickly as Florida’s shame was put on display on the international stage
Click here to read about the 2015 disaster
The FWC Commissioners in charge
Back in December 2024 the commission said no action was needed regarding the bear population. That all changed the following month when Commissioner Gary Lester asked, or was it demanded, the bear management division come up with a proposal for a bear hunt. Lester just happens to be vice president of the massive The Villages in central Florida a.k.a. bear country. He has a proposal to expand into Leesburg , no coincidence bears also live there. I suspect killing the bears to clear a path for his housing project is his agenda and why he cast his vote last May for yes on the hunt.
Commissioner Rodney Barreto is a former Miami City cop during the 1980s, the heyday of the drug cartels, dirty deals and violence. Corruption seemed to be everywhere. In 2021 Barreto got into hot water when he tried to get several acres of submerged land he bought four years earlier, filled and dredged in the Lake Worth Lagoon. He tried to do this without state or FWC approval for the condos he planned. The media which still exposed corruption back then reported on it and the deal was squashed, though I suspect it will reappear again. It’s no wonder he votes for bear hunts in his mind land is only valuable if his buildings sit on them. He was quoted on video saying he’s a business man which begs the question why are developers and hunters the only commissioners of a so called wildlife conservation agency? Or is it just a CON?
As of 2024 these are the listed active companies Rodney Barreto has, could be others:
Otter Creek Investments, Inc. 1990
Otter Creek Market, Inc. 1991
235 Catalonia, Inc. 1996
Barreto Holdings, LLC 2002
Barreto Management Limited Liability Company 2003
12310 LLC 2005
Blue Water Express, LLC 2006
Bg Commercial, LLC 2007
Barreto Cunningham May Dudley, doing business as Floridian Partners, formed in 2009. They provide consulting, strategic advice, and lobbying services. The Company specializes in areas such as campaigns, elections, legislative, and insurance regulatory practices, as well as telecommunications and utilities.
Silver Oak Plantation Ts, LLC 2010
Plan B Marine, LLC 2015
Bnm Opa, LLC 2016
·Government Lot 1, LLC 2016
·Barreto Capital LLC 2017
·Btw Investments, LLC 2019
Rodney & Sheila Barreto Family Foundation, Inc 2019
Barreto Real Estate Group, LLC 2021 (run by son Bradley)
Commissioner Preston Farrior is a big game bow hunter. He has lots of photos of himself with many dead animals he proudly displays with zero compunction. Of course he wants a cruel trophy by bow hunting of bears, he obviously enjoys killing from all of his published selfies on instagram and bow hunting magazines. Pictures show his true colors.
Commissioner Gary Nicklaus claimed he wasn’t behind the secret plot to develop Florida state parks with golf courses, pickleball courts and spas. But he is partner of Nicklaus, Brown & Co which designs golf course all over the world. Of course it’s hard to believe Nicklaus, a former pro golfer himself, wasn’t pushing for golf courses. His father was famous golfer Jack Nicklaus who tried the same thing in 2011 where he would design them. Coincidence?
Commissioner Steve Hudson, Vice Chair and also a hunter. He’s the CEO of Hudson Capital Group which is a huge development company. Conflict of interest?
Commissioner Sonya Rood is a hunter, I think her vote for hunting is self-explanatory. At the May 2025 meeting in Ocala she pretended to not know how cruel archery was, hard to imagine a hunter not knowing that arrows rarely kill immediately that seems like hunter knowledge 101 to me.
If it’s not clear that developers run this fake agency go back read it again. Not one commissioner has any tangible conservation expertise and was placed by either Gov. Scott or Gov. Desantis to hold the seat for more unnecessary development. All of which the commissioners and governors benefit from in some form.
How do most people feel about bears? They want them protected not slaughtered as shown in FWC’s own bear management survey and nothing has changed except the agency’s attitude toward them.
True colors of FWC
Most of the public is unaware of the dirty tactics and secret deals FWC engages in but word is getting out. While the majority of people DO support conservation and protecting our air, water and food they are pretty much in the dark about the agencies their tax dollars pay for. Most are easily fooled with slick public relations stunts and by controlling the media. FWC knows few will take the time to research what’s really going on. When they do they’re shocked and angry.
Click here to read more about how this agency really operates. They make claims of protecting Manatees, Panthers, Sea Turtles, the water and it’s all a lie. I’ve seen it firsthand. Also included in the article is how this agency lacks all decency or ethics. They have their own non- profit called Fish & Wildlife Foundation of Florida that admitted a whopping $10,777,105 on their 2020 IRS 990 tax form.
Bear Warriors United has been working for years educating people who live in bear country about ‘bear proofing’ their trash. This non lethal method does work with a proven track record. Bears don’t want you trash but when their home is depleted of food they will look elsewhere. So would you if you were starving and had kids to feed. Katrina Shadix, founder of Bear Warriors had this enlightening statement “I think it’s important that word gets out that hunters are being used as tools, literally and figuratively, to wipe bears off the landscape which makes it easier to develop. The hunters are doing this at a time when habitat for wildlife is facing the biggest habitat loss and water contamination crises in the history of the state. Bears are the sentinels of our forests as manatees are the sentinels of our waters.” She added, and I agree, how reckless the government is.
“and the government is taking great plea$ure….and profit.…in killing them both.”
If we fail to save them who will?
Former FWC law enforcement investigator speaks out about fraud & corruption
I spoke with a former FWC law enforcement officer who worked there for 14 years , for 8 of those years as an investigator, also doing undercover work and as a rescue diver. For now we’ll use ‘John Doe’ as his name. We spoke in 2024 and he had this to say “you’ll never be able to prove things because the way they hide things is very intricate and detailed and they know exactly what their doing.”
When explaining how FWC would investigate poachers he said they were the bigger offender killing as many animals as needed “so let’s say we wanted to infiltrate some poachers right, so we would go out and we would kill whatever that particular species would be but not just kill, we would kill I’m talking about hundreds and hundreds of deer, fish, alligators, you name it birds, squirrels, anything it took and this is not on the clock work. You’re getting paid but it’s not documented. So what the agency would have us do is go procure product, in other words, if they wanted to get some bad guys to look awesome to the media, you know some guys that were maybe killing a few deer we would go out and meet and kill droves of deer just to sell to them or we would go out, say they’re selling fish, we would go out and catch hundreds of them with the help of the biologists and we’d net them by the hundreds, thousands some time so we were committing felonies on the clock to catch people committing misdemeanors.”
Click here to listen to the above clip about poaching
He confirmed what I have also witnessed and long known that government work is a free pass to not work and how they don’t give care about wildlife or the oceans or anything but money. Regarding FDEP, they are charged with protecting the environment like the forests were the bears live, are just as corrupt. FWC and FDEP work in tandem but not for the greater good as they have both been co-opted by developers and politicians like Gov. Desantis who cater to them.
“ Government work is a free pass to not doing sh*t . Nobody does anything about it So FDEP was the ultimate. It was very well known in state law enforcement if you were to get a job with FDEP that is a free pass to not doing sh*t for the rest of your life.” …….they don’t care if a thousand f*cking sea turtles die (I can also attest to that) it’s all a dog and pony show for both those agencies.”
Click here to listen to the above clip about the truth about government agencies
The full interview runs 50 minutes but you see how FWC really operates no matter what the species no matter what the damage it’s all lies, fraud and corruption for a few making money.
The proposed 2025 hunt & how it will be more cruel
After reading about who makes the decision and why, this is how it differs from 2015. This year marks an even more perverse and cruel policy to hunt bears. Aside from ignoring overwhelming public outcry against the hunt FWC is planning to push it through. This demonstrates what many have long known that government on all levels operates for themselves and the privileged that ‘$upport’ them. Those that stand in the shadows with large open pocketbooks and secret bank accounts truly run the government, put people in power via a rigged election system and write the laws and policies the public falsely thinks will help them.
Among the new add-ons for 2025 are:
Bait traps - Remember what Roosevelt said about tied up bears? Bait traps are very much like that. Picture yourself being a little hungry, you see a snack and go for it. Suddenly you’re shot for no reason. You didn’t attack, charge or bite anyone but killed anyway just because you were there. Now you know how the bears feel. This is what girly cowards do.
Hounding/dog hunting – It’s barbaric, because it is. Never mind that British upper crust use dogs to rip apart foxes in their excuse of a tradition it’s no less unseemly and cowardly for any species. Imagine a pack of dogs, probably violently abused as this method is extra violent, chasing you. Being terrified you are conscious you can’t escape as they bite and rip your flesh from you causing extreme pain. Sounds like psychopathic behavior right? This is how many deer are killed in America too.
Click here to see the truth about using dogs to hunt
NO check stations - Because when you do something so insidious you know deep down is a sick crime against nature you don’t want witnesses taking pictures. Why else would they ban the public? In 2015 photos of slaughtered cubs, yearlings and nursing mothers made the global internet trek around the world so FWC won’t have any of that this time. This is really just a plan to wipeout bears altogether.
Archery - This may sound like a fun sport but death by arrow is slow and painful and not one any human would want for themselves. Using this method is for those that like to inflict pain.
Beware of fake conservation or environmental groups who support hunting and spoke in favor of another bear hunt. “Bear is a game species. It’s time for us to have some level of bear hunt,” said Travis Thompson, executive director at the All Florida conservation organization as reported by the Associate Press May 21. 2025.
How you can help Stop the Hunt
Email the commissioners and ask them to vote NO in August on the 2025 bear hunt and ask how they don’t have a conflict of interest when their resume says otherwise
Morgan.Richardson@myfwc.com - Director, Hunting & Game Management Division
Call and Email Governor DeSantis
Tell him you oppose the hunt and support protecting black bears.
Phone Number: (850) 717-9337GovernorRon.Desantis@eog.myflorida.com
Email the FWC
Subject: I Oppose the Florida Black Bear Hunt to: BearComments@MyFWC.com
You can simply write: “I oppose the Florida black bear hunt.”
Click to sign & share
**Attend the vote –
Dates: August 13th - 14th, 2025
Time: 8:30 AM - 5:00 PM (Arrive at 7:30 am to register to speak).
Location: Florida Highway Patrol Training Academy
75 College Ave., Havana, Florida 32333
Support groups working to save the bears
Call for a change of who sits on the FWC Commission, only true conservationists should ever be allowed to work for FWC or FDEP otherwise it’s just fraud. This is true in all 50 states.
I fully support Staci‑Lee Sherwood’s powerful exposé on Florida’s proposed 2025 black bear hunt, which many of us regard as not just unethical but outright barbaric. Her compelling account cuts through the sanitized rhetoric of so‑called “management” to reveal a chilling truth: this hunt is less about wildlife science and more about clearing land for development—using bears as a convenient scapegoat.
Bear biology underscores how mismatched this hunt truly is. Florida’s black bears reproduce slowly: females first breed at four years and deliver cubs only every 2–3 years. Removing breeding females—especially nursing mothers—risk orphaning cubs that are doomed to starve. Trophy hunters, wielding bait traps, dogs, or arrows, actively target these vital adults. That’s not wildlife management—it’s population sabotage. Sherwood…