Battle Lines Drawn Over Bear Bill : Wildlife: Move to bar the use of tracking dogs is gaining support from animal rights groups. But the hunting lobby calls the method humane.

Hoping to replay an emotional battle over hunting, animal lovers are seeking to turn the California black bear into the latest four-pawed poster child, just like the mountain lion before it.

Animal welfare groups won a 1990 initiative fight to ban mountain lion hunts. Now, many of the same organizations want to restrict or prohibit bear hunts--and again turn to voters if necessary. Hunters kill 1,200 bears annually in California.

State Sen. Nicholas C. Petris, an Oakland Democrat who fought to curtail cougar hunts, is carrying legislation to restrict bear hunts by barring the use of tracking dogs, a technique he likens to “search and destroy missions.”

At a hearing attended by 150 hunters and their lobbyists last week, Petris told how hunters place high-tech collars with radio transmitters on their hounds. While the dogs pursue their prey, the hunters track the progress of the hunt on radio receivers.

The chase can go on for miles through rugged terrain. When the bear finally becomes exhausted, it seeks refuge by climbing a tree. By following the dogs’ radio signals, hunters can determine when and where the bruin is treed. Then, they hike to site and shoot their quarry at close range.

“They call themselves sportsmen,” Petris said, his voice full of sarcasm. “I don’t know where the sport is in that.”

Supporters of curtailing the practice range from a nursery school to major animal welfare groups and mainstream environmental groups, such as the Sierra Club. But Petris acknowledged that the bill is in for a fight, and other senators and lobbyists gave the legislation little chance of success.

The Senate Natural Resources Committee, which has not voted on the Petris bill, has directed the state Department of Fish and Game to return with more information on the effect of the hunts on California’s black bear population.

Petris, a senator since 1966 and now in his final term, is a veteran of fights with hunting and gun lobbies. He carried the bill to ban the use of dogs in mountain lion hunts. The measure cleared the legislature in 1987 but was vetoed by then-Gov. George Deukmejian.

If Petris’ bear bill fails to become law, environmentalists vow to do as they did in 1990: come back with an initiative that would seek to impose a ban on bear hunts altogether.

“If a plebiscite (to prohibit bear hunts) were held, we think 80% of the people would support it,” said Wayne Pacelle of the Fund for Animals.

The New York-based Fund for Animals, which helped draft an initiative to ban the use of hounds in bear hunts in Colorado, is the official sponsor of Petris’ bill. The Colorado measure overwhelmingly passed in November. The group was also instrumental in the 1990 initiative to prohibit mountain lion hunting in California, which 52% of voters supported.

“This plays well on the heartstrings of the public,” state Sen. Don Rogers (R-Tehachapi) said of the bear bill.

Like other opponents of the Petris bill, Rogers said hunts keep the bear population from exploding. Rogers cited Fish and Game estimates that the bear population is at its highest point since 1949--17,000 to 24,000. He and other foes raised the possibility that bears might start to starve, kill their young or move into populated areas.

“There is nothing sporting about Mother Nature when there’s an overpopulation,” Rogers said.

The Department of Fish and Game plans to sell up to 15,000 permits at $23 each to bear hunters this year, but officials say fewer than 10% of the hunters will be successful. The 100-day season will be called off when 1,250 bears are bagged.

Last year, 1,237 bears were killed legally, the fifth-highest total since the state started limiting the kills in 1957. State game officials estimate that 300 bears are killed illegally each year, although environmentalists contend that poaching takes a far higher toll.

Fish and Game experts say dogs are used in 70% of all successful hunts. The department plans to allow their use this season. Officials and hunters say dogs help make for more humane kills. Hunters have a better chance of killing a bear if it is perched in a tree, rather than running through a forest. When dogs are used, wounded bears are less likely to escape.

“It’s good wildlife management,” said Gerald Upholt, a lobbyist for the California Rifle and Pistol Assn.

For supporters of Petris’ bill, the California black bear is “a powerful symbol,” said state Sen. Art Torres (D-Los Angeles). The method by which most of them are killed “is just not fair.”

A male black bear can weigh up to 400 pounds and live 20 years. The bear’s mountain habitat includes the San Gabriels, the ranges of Ventura and Santa Barbara counties, and the Sierra, Cascades and Siskiyous.

California also was once home to the grizzly bear, which lives on in this state only as fabric and dye on the state flag. Grizzlies were hunted to extinction in California. The last was killed by a rancher in 1922.