Bear dies after move to Maine
By Gwendolyn Craig
The Adirondack Wildlife Refuge has found new homes for its dozen animals regulated by the state, though an escapist black bear died shortly after arriving at its new destination. The transfers mark the end of an era for owners Steve and Wendy Hall, who gave numerous educational presentations involving wolves, bears and bald eagles.
Wendy Hall was the sole state and federal license holder for the Wilmington refuge and was forced to find new homes for the animals after relinquishing her authorization to continue running the refuge. Steve Hall and others worked under her as designated agents. A stream of records dating back to 2015 show the Halls and their staff had covered up animal escapes, made false statements to regulators and frequently operated without proper licenses.
Earlier this year the state Department of Environmental Conservation notified Wendy Hall it would revoke her remaining wildlife licenses. In July, Wendy Hall surrendered them. The DEC extended an Oct. 25 deadline to allow her time to relocate a few of the animals. Nature Walks Conservation Society, a nonprofit organization based out of Massachusetts, assisted with the placements.
The refuge has reported all animals have now been sent to new homes, the DEC said.
Steve Hall said a Eurasian lynx named Kayla is at a temporary home with a rehabilitation specialist. The lynx was showing signs of stress when staff prepared it for a flight to its final destination in Oregon, so they have since changed plans. Staff now intend to drive the lynx to a rescue facility in Florida in about a week, Steve Hall said in a Nov. 1 email to the Adirondack Explorer.
Most of the other transfers appear to have been successful except one with a tragic end.
Ahote, a five-year-old female black bear the Halls raised since she was a cub, died about 36 hours after arriving at the Maine Wildlife Park in Gray, Maine. The park is an educational facility with over 30 different species. It is run by Maine’s Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife.
Mark Latti, communications director for the department, said the wildlife park was excited to welcome Ahote and her companion Luvey. The park had been home to two black bears, but both recently died at ages 28 and 35. Black bears generally live around 30 years in the wild.
The refuge’s two coyotes and the pair of bears, two of the Halls’ more well-known animals, were transported to Maine at the end of October. The bears had escaped their Adirondack enclosure twice, once in 2019 and again in 2021.
Latti said an independent vet examined Ahote’s body and determined she had died from “capture myopathy.” The non-infectious disease is caused when an animal overexerts itself and their bodily systems shut down. Latti said the disease is more common in deer than in bears, but it has been known to happen to many animals when they are relocated or captured. Latti said staff at the wildlife park noticed Ahote was nervous, pacing and running when she arrived at their facility. Steve Hall said the name Ahote means “restless one.”
Luvey appeared to be doing well and adjusting, and so were the two coyotes, Latti said.
Steve Hall said handlers from the Maine Wildlife Park arrived at the refuge and helped carry Luvey and Ahote to travel containers that were intended for lions. The Maine staff did “everything by the book,” Steve Hall said, and he didn’t blame them for Ahote’s death.
He did blame the DEC for not reviewing wildlife license applications from proposed successors soon enough to keep the bears and other animals at the refuge and prevent the transfer.
The DEC blamed the Halls. “The transport could have been prevented if the Halls had cooperated with DEC’s multiple attempts to bring AWR (Adirondack Wildlife Refuge) into compliance during repeated violations of state and federal laws, regulations and license conditions that are in place to protect public safety, native wildlife, and regulated animals possessed under licenses issued by DEC,” a DEC spokesperson responded, adding that Ahote’s death was “a very sad and unfortunate event.”
“The DEC always claims that they are protecting the public and the animals, but the real result of forcing us to rehome the wolves, bears, etc. has been the loss of a key educational center for students, as well as an economic benefit to High Peaks hotels, restaurants and other merchants,” Steve Hall wrote. “We can now add to this dubious distinction the death of Ahote, as well as half the raptors the regulatory bodies insisted that we rehome.”
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service had similar dealings with the Halls when it came to long-term violations with migratory birds and bald eagles. The federal agency denied renewing Wendy Hall’s licenses for working with birds, and at the beginning of January 2020, she was ordered to find new homes for all those in her possession. Steve Hall said they’d warned regulators that many of the birds were older and transferring them “did not bode well.” Steve Hall claimed that about six birds had died after getting relocated.
Earlier, the Halls and the Nature Walks Conservation Society wanted the refuge’s general manager Hanna Cromie and staff member Donald Tourtellot to take on the wildlife licenses and keep the animals at the refuge. The DEC denied their applications, citing false statements and other violations the two participated in at the refuge. Cromie and Tourtellot, in written depositions filed with the DEC during Ahote and Luvey’s first escape, admitted to breaking a tree to make it look like the bears’ escape was an “act of God.” The bears had actually dug out of their enclosure and rambled into the woods. At that time, the Halls did not have a perimeter fence as required by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Kevin and Jackie Woodcock, who Steve Hall said have been helping them upgrade the refuge’s animal enclosures, have applied for these wildlife licenses now. Steve Hall said the DEC has denied that it received the applications, but the DEC told the Explorer it received those applications and is reviewing them. Jackie Woodcock and Steve Hall both write on occasion for the Explorer’s community-run forum, the Adirondack Almanack.
Steve Hall said Wendy Hall is dying of cancer. They continue to live on the refuge property, though Steve Hall said Wendy Hall is no longer part of the refuge’s management. He hopes the Woodcocks and others can take over. The Nature Walks Conservation Society is also working with the refuge. Its board of directors includes the Halls’ son and daughter-in-law, Dan and Magdalena.
“Don’t worry about the Wildlife Refuge,” Steve Hall wrote in a comment. “We’re not going anywhere, and will be reorganizing, bringing forth more education on various topics.”
The DEC said the refuge can operate if the Halls and the facility stay free of state-regulated wildlife and don’t engage in wildlife rehabilitation or another activity under “DEC jurisdiction.”
What is the value of the Adirondack Wildlife Refuge to the citizens of New York State? For starters, 50,000 people visit the Refuge every year. To most Chambers of Commerce and Visitor Bureaus, that means more hotel and motel rooms, and more seats in restaurants. No one doubts that we are valuable to the local economies, and our reviews on Trip Advisor and other rating systems bear this out.
More importantly, every school and college within 100 miles of the Refuge, routinely sends their students to the Refuge, so these professors and teachers obviously see value in exposing their students to our education program. During this process of relieving Wendy of her rehab and collect and possess licenses, the DEC has never discussed or even acknowledged any values to the citizenry beyond the DEC’s rules and regulations. They simply don’t care!
As you know, Wendy is now dying of an inoperable sarcoma, and currently in home hospice. She can barely walk and has had nothing to do with the Refuge for the past year. I’m now 74 and trying to retire. I’m currently Wendy’s main hospice support person, and when she passes, I will likely spend most of my time between Alaska, BC and Yellowstone. I’ve always taken two months of each year to go find my favorite animals, grizzlies, moose and wolves, and I’ll just expand that period.
We have suggested to the DEC again and again that they let a new management team take over the Refuge, run the rehab and collect and possess, and everyone, from the citizenry, the tourists, the students, and to the church, scouting and social groups, everyone wins. With the DEC’s solution, effectively shutting the Refuge down until new licenses are approved, everyone loses. This is not about fixing the problem. This is about fixing the blame. This is merely punishment.
Wendy is an artist, not a clerk, and she admitted that she was careless with the paperwork, and guilty of violations, even though some of them were silly and made no sense, like the ear tag violation involving the bears, while others were using the wrong form or not having the paperwork done in a timely manner. Please publish the attached pastel by Wendy, to give your readers another sense of who Wendy is. She’s done a hell of a lot more for wildlife than any of these bureaucrats, and she knows a hell of a lot more about wildlife than any of them.
Anyone who has worked with wild or captive bred animals, quickly figures out that higher mammals are very much like us in the sense that they all have unique personalities, which results in different sets of hopes, fears and expectations. While all bears try to escape, Ahote was obviously very happy at the Wildlife Refuge.
Those bears knew me the way your dog knows you. How else do you explain that both bears, who had gotten separated after their escape, ended up following us home individually through the woods. The brown phase black bear, Luvey, followed us for 4 miles, with no restraints, collars or leashes, and walked right into her enclosure. (How would you control a 250 lb bear anyway?) During this period, I emailed Joe Therrien of Special Licenses, asking for DEC recommendations for rebuilding the bear enclosure according to their specs. He didn’t even bother to reply, and I’ll be happy to provide a copy of my email to him.
We certainly don’t blame the Refuge which adopted the bears, as they came, sedated the bears, helped us carry them to travel containers (for lions!), everything by the book, and brought them to their new home. Luvey is apparently adopting well.
Another example of the individuality of animal personalities is Kayla the Eurasian Lynx, who was supposed to be flown to a Refuge in Oregon, but was so freaked out by the process, we had to rehome her temporarily with another rehabber. Alex and Hanna will be driving her to a cat rescue place in Florida in about a week, and hopefully she will survive the trip.
As we mentioned previously, when Wendy was forced to rehome her raptors, we warned the regulators that the advanced age of about half of these raptors, along with the fact that they could not fly and were very adjusted to their homes at the Refuge, as well as their handlers, did not bode well for transferring them. Sure enough, half of them died, including a rough legged hawk, Swainson’s hawk, northern goshawk, kestrel, short eared owl and crow. Our animals all receive regular check ups from.the vet, and these raptors were all doing fine, until they were relocated.
Many folks believe Wendy should have been more careful with her paperwork, and we agree. But at what point does the actual welfare of the animals become a factor in the bureaucrats’ decision-making process. We’ve seen that they don’t care about the economy, and they don’t care about the students. At what point do they make decisions that are in the interests of the citizens they serve?
Which brings us to Kevin and Jackie Woodcock, who were nominated by the non-profit to take over the collect and possess licenses, so that none of the animals would have to be moved. The Woodcocks are naturalists and authors, experts in butterflies, bees and nature generally. Most importantly, they have no connection to Wendy and did not work at the Refuge when her violations occurred, and would be perfect candidates to run the Refuge for the non-profit.
As part of the process of trying to bring the Refuge up to DEC standards, they redesigned and rebuilt all the mammal enclosures. This included building a 1,520 foot perimeter fence which ended once and for all, any critter escape from the Refuge grounds. We placed an electric fence in the bear enclosure, ending any attempts to dig out. We spent $200,000, of which $140,000 had to be borrowed from the bank. Problem solved for the DEC? Guess again!
The DEC says their regulations are meant to protect the public and the animals in our care. The fact is that only one person has been killed by a black bear in New York in the last 150 years, and with the addition of the electric fence, there will be no more bear escapes. There has been no wolf escape since their new enclosure was built six years ago. So while the DEC claims to be have been worried about the animals in our care, we have never succeeded in causing the death of any of our animals, while the rehoming directives by the DEC have done exactly that.
Attached is the UPS receipt that confirms that the DEC signed for and received the Woodcock’s application on Sept 22nd. The DEC’s own rules from their web site claims that the DEC must respond to all applications within 15 days of receipt, or explain why they can’t, and now, 6 weeks later, they still deny having received it! This is a constant pattern with the DEC. They sign for something, and then deny that they received it. You email them, and they can’t be bothered to answer. We have streams and streams of emails proving just that.
While we’re all familiar with the glacial pace of government bureaucracies, this brings incompetence to a whole new level, unless it is a strategy of delay and obfuscate, that is, wait until the critters are all gone, which they are, making the collect and possess license a moot point until a new licensee is approved. Imagine if the people of New York could hold the DEC to the same level of expectation licensees are held to.
It gets crazier. Lyme disease is a major health issue in New York, not at the level of COVID, but still a serious consideration for folks who spend time outdoors. For those new to how Lyme disease works, black legged ticks are the carriers, but not the source of the Borrelia Burgdorferi bacteria. The ticks pick the bacteria up from rodents, and then pass it on to you.
The red fox is clearly our best defense against Lyme, because of the sheer volume of rodents they eat. Wouldn’t you think that the state would immediately ban the trapping of any predator that eats rodents, just as it is illegal to hunt birds of prey? Wrong again. The DEC not only encourages trapping, the cruelest and most inefficient form of hunting, as we have rehabbed eagles caught in fox traps, but they encourage trapping and even have a mentoring program for your young children!
Poor Ahote. :(:(:( that’s terrible, and frankly I’m gonna refrain from a lot of unkind words about the DEC’s statement as quoted. I would caution anyone from the DEC who reads this comment to remember that you’re public servants representing government. You’re the powerful, institutional party in this exchange. No one – not on the right or left – likes authoritarian, enforcement-obsessed government. I am less and less convinced that the DEC is remotely motivated by public safety or wellbeing in this case.
Unrelated sidebar: I appreciate that it is noted here that some parties involved in all of this write for the Almanack. Jackie just had a nice article over the weekend, I believe.
Kayla the lynx did indeed make the trip to FL. I tried to post the YouTube Link here, but it did not get posted. If you want to see her in her temporary home, just search YT for “Max Canada Lynx meets Kayla E. Lynx”. She seems pretty comfortable. I don’t know if she is still there.
NYS/DEC can certainly show backbone when it wants to – but brains should be employed before backbone. Rehabbers and rehab facilities do not grow on trees. This activity is a labor of love, not simply a profession (which implies getting paid!). First, you have to find someone willing to work round the clock to be a volunteer rehabber, then they need a place to do it. The animals come to them for many reasons – some are emergencies, some are issues of neglect or the inability for others to care for the animals. We need MORE rehab and long-term care facilities, not fewer. I believe this issue could have been resolved in a more constructive way. Were NYS/DEC truly advocating for these and future animals, or simply enforcing laws? Who “won”??