Sussex County led the take with 178 of the 367 bears killed in Segment A. Whether the season gains four days in December turns on a single number: the share of tagged bears killed, now at 14.8 percent against a 20 percent threshold.
The first segment of the 2026 black bear season closed Oct. 17 with 367 bears killed, and one question remains: whether the season adds four days in mid-December. The answer turns on the share of tagged bears killed, 21 of the 142 the New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife tagged this season, a rate the division puts at 14.8 percent. If the rate stands below 20 percent when Segment B ends Dec. 12, the season extends.
The season runs in two segments; the first ran Oct. 12-17, with five zones open. Sussex County recorded 178, nearly half the total, followed by Warren with 88, Morris with 61, Passaic with 26 and Hunterdon with 14. Bergen, Somerset and Mercer recorded zero, according to the division's harvest table.
Opening day accounted for 110 of the 367 bears, roughly 30 percent of the segment total; the next-heaviest day was Oct. 15 with 78. The segment opened Oct. 12 for archery and added muzzleloaders for its final three days. Segment B runs Dec. 7-12, shotgun and muzzleloader only. The bag limit is one bear per segment, with a 75-pound live-weight minimum and a ban on taking adults accompanied by cubs under 75 pounds.
The hunt returned in 2022 after several-year pause
Hunting on state lands resumed under Executive Order 310, signed by then-Governor Phil Murphy in 2022. The state had suspended state-land hunting in 2018 to test whether non-lethal management alone could control bears, and the prior management plan lapsed in 2021, leaving no season on the books.
Executive Order 310, citing a 237 percent rise in reported bear incidents and a population estimate near 3,000, declared immediate action necessary; emergency rules produced the December 2022 hunt, per the executive order and the division's FAQs.
A judge halted the hunt days before its start in November 2022; a two-judge appellate panel including that same judge allowed it to proceed on Dec. 6, per the Herald and the New Jersey Monitor.
The Fish and Game Council approved the current Comprehensive Black Bear Management Policy on Sept. 6, 2023, and then-Commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection Shawn LaTourette signed it. The policy authorizes annual seasons through 2028, according to the division's FAQs and the Congressional Sportsmen's Foundation.
Black bear permits cost $2 apiece on top of a hunting license. The state allocated 11,000 permits, each tied to a specific zone; a hunter may hold two at a time, for different zones, but may kill only one bear in a segment. A permit unused in Segment A remains valid for Segment B. The first sales period closed this month; unsold permits return to sale at 10 a.m. Nov. 2, according to the division's permits page.
Hunters must bring every bear to a check station on the day of the kill, where staff validate the permit, register the bear, issue a legal possession seal and record its sex, weight and size before pulling a tooth for aging. Four stations ran for Segment A, 9 a.m. to 9 p.m.: Pequest in Oxford Township, Whittingham in Fredon, Flatbrook Roy in Sandyston and Black River in Chester, the last open only on opening day and the final day, Oct. 17.
A hunter who kills a bear too late in the day to reach a station must phone the Northern Region Office of the Bureau of Law Enforcement immediately and bring the head and hide in for registration the next day, per the season rules and the 2026-2027 hunting digest.
Hunters as young as 10 may take part, but the season rules require those 10 through 13 to stay with a licensed adult of 21 or older who also holds a bear permit.
Hunt extension depends on tagged bears
Division biologists tag bears whenever one is handled for research or after a nuisance complaint, and the division describes the year's tagged bears as the scientific basis for its harvest determinations. This season's table lists 142 tagged bears available for harvest. Of the 367 bears in Segment A, 21 were tagged, for a rate of 14.8 percent. Only tagged bears enter the rate; untagged bears count toward the season total but do not move the percentage.
Under the 2026 season rules, when Segment B ends a cumulative rate below 20 percent extends the hunt to Dec. 16-19. This season, the division will announce on Monday, Dec. 14, whether the extension days run. Reaching 30 percent at any point ends the season, effective 24 hours after the decision, with notice posted to the division's website and hunting email list. A rate between the two closes the season on schedule Dec. 12. Only hunters who did not fill a Segment B permit may take part in the extension days.
With 21 tagged bears killed as of the end of Segment A, seven more in Segment B brings the total to 28 and the rate to 19.7 percent, and the season extends. Eight more puts it at 29, or 20.4 percent, and the season closes on schedule.
The 2025 season ran long after hunters took 454 bears across the two scheduled segments, 368 in Segment A and 86 in Segment B, for a rate of 19.3 percent of tagged bears at the close, according to the department's Dec. 15, 2025, announcement and contemporaneous reporting by WRNJ Radio and News 12. The 2023 season also ran past its scheduled close. The 2024 season closed on schedule, with 24.1 percent of tagged bears.
Bear incidents have risen, but most are nuisance-level
Reported bear incidents rose 22.4 percent from Jan. 1 through Sept. 21: 1,196 against 977 in the same stretch of 2025, per division data carried by New Jersey 101.5 and the Congressional Sportsmen's Foundation. The division's categories run from bears entering homes and aggressive encounters down to property damage and nuisance sightings. The rise sits mostly in nuisance-level reports; in the most serious category, reports moved from 80 to 83, a 3.8 percent increase.
The Congressional Sportsmen's Foundation, citing the rise in its Oct. 19 essay, called regulated black bear hunting "an important tool for managing wildlife populations and maintaining balance between bears and the areas they inhabit," funded by "license and permit fees and federal excise taxes on firearms, ammunition, and archery equipment."
Taylor McFarland, New Jersey Sierra Club conservation program manager, said in an Oct. 6 statement: "Continuing with another hunt without non-lethal management laws is just a band-aid solution." The statement calls for "mandating bear-proof garbage containers in areas with a high population of bears." Trash-related nuisance cases, it notes, are the most common bear complaint in the state.
State records document one fatal bear encounter: September 2014, in West Milford, Passaic County, according to the division's account of the attack.
Fish and Game Council develops rules for hunt
The Fish and Game Council, created by law in 1945, sets the policy the Division of Fish and Wildlife administers. The all-volunteer council has 11 seats.
The governor appoints every member, with the advice and consent of the Senate. Six of the seats come from a list of nominees supplied by the New Jersey State Federation of Sportsmen's Clubs, three from nominees of the state agricultural convention, and one from a public member knowledgeable in land use, appointed directly by the Governor. The eleventh seat belongs to the chair of the Endangered and Nongame Species Advisory Committee, who serves by virtue of that office, according to the council's published history, the division's councils page and N.J.S.A. 13:1B-24.
The last two seats date to a 1979 restructuring that replaced two commercial-fishermen seats when the state created the Marine Fisheries Council.
State Sen. Brian P. Stack (D, 33rd District) introduced S471 on Jan. 13, 2026, to swap three sportsmen seats for three nominated by animal-welfare groups, defined in the bill as 501(c)(3) nonprofits. The Senate withdrew the bill from consideration on May 21, 2026, the bill's status history shows. The withdrawal leaves the council's current composition in place.
Unsold permits return to sale at 10 a.m. Nov. 2. The current plan runs out in 2028, and replacing it takes the same two-step that produced this one: a council vote and the commissioner's signature.
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Sources
• LegiScan, "New Jersey Senate Bill No. S471," LegiScan (May 21, 2026)
• "New Jersey 2026-2027 Hunting and Trapping Digest," eRegulations (accessed October 25, 2026)
• "Bear Hunting Season Information," New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, Division of Fish and Wildlife (accessed October 25, 2026)
• "Black Bear Harvest Data," New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, Division of Fish and Wildlife (October 19, 2026)
• "Black Bear Management FAQs," New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, Division of Fish and Wildlife (September 25, 2026)
• "Councils and Committees," New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, Division of Fish and Wildlife (accessed October 25, 2026)
• "Fish and Game Council," New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, Division of Fish and Wildlife (accessed October 25, 2026)
• "Obtaining Hunting and Trapping Permits," New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, Division of Fish and Wildlife (September 11, 2026)
• "The West Milford Fatal Bear Attack, September 21, 2014," New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, Division of Fish and Wildlife (accessed October 25, 2026)
• "Bear Hunt Extended Through Dec. 20; Hunters Remain Below 20% Threshold," New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (December 15, 2025)
• "Division of Fish and Wildlife Announces Four Day Extension of Bear Harvest," New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (December 10, 2017)
• New Jersey Legislature, "Bill No. S471, An Act concerning the membership of the Fish and Game Council," New Jersey Legislature (2026)
• "Executive Order No. 310," New Jersey Office of the Governor (November 15, 2022)
• "N.J.S.A. 13:1B-24, Fish and Game Council membership," New Jersey Statutes Annotated (2025)
• Congressional Sportsmen's Foundation, "New Jersey Fish and Game Council Sets Annual Bear Hunt Until 2028," Congressional Sportsmen's Foundation (September 25, 2023)
• Congressional Sportsmen's Foundation, "New Jersey's Bear Hunt Highlights the Importance of Hunting as a Wildlife Management Tool," Congressional Sportsmen's Foundation (October 19, 2026)
• "NJ bear encounters rise 22%: Counties with the most reports," New Jersey 101.5 (October 9, 2026)
• Terrence T. McDonald, "N.J. bear hunt begins after judges rule against animal rights groups," New Jersey Monitor (December 6, 2022)
• "NJ bear hunt extended as hunters fail to meet harvest threshold," News 12 New Jersey (December 15, 2025)
• "Appeals court rules NJ bear hunt can move forward," NJ Herald (December 6, 2022)
• "N.J. bear hunt delayed as legal battle begins," NJ Herald (December 1, 2022)
• Jay Edwards, "New Jersey extends black bear hunting season Dec. 17-20 for shotgun, muzzleloader hunters," WRNJ Radio (December 16, 2025)
• "NJ Falls Short on Addressing Non-Lethal Bear Management: Hunt Begins," Sierra Club New Jersey Chapter, statement (October 6, 2026)
Photo: NPS/Neal Lewis