Some hope remains on Canadian polar bear trophies: U.S. official

A high-ranking U.S. official says there may be hope that American sport hunters can bring home the polar bears they hunted in Canada's North, while American hunters scramble to deal with a ban placed this week on importing polar bear trophies.

The ban came into effect when the U.S. government listed the polar bear as a threatened species Wednesday under its Endangered Species Act.

The threatened status automatically makes the polar bear a "depleted" species under the U.S. Marine Mammal Protection Act, meaning it cannot be hunted and imported into the U.S.

But Lyle Laverty, the U.S. assistant secretary of the interior for fish, wildlife and parks, told CBC News that there is some hope that an exception could be made for polar bear trophies, even though polar bears are now a threatened species.

"What we're going to have to do is work with the Congress," Laverty said Thursday.

"I don't want to say it's simple, but with just a little amendment to the Marine Mammal Protection Act, [Congress] can make a provision that would permit the importation of a trophy from Canada."

Laverty said he cannot say how likely this could happen, as U.S. officials will have to meet to discuss the matter.

Import ban being challenged in court

He noted that it's a plus that Canada manages its polar bear populations and sport hunts well — something that may help in lifting the ban on polar bear trophy imports.

Meanwhile, the import ban is being challenged in court by American hunters.

Polar bears remain a species "of special concern" in Canada, which is a less serious classification than "threatened" and "endangered."

The U.S. government's move to list polar bears as a threatened species was based on findings that bears' Arctic sea ice habitat, vital to their survival, has dramatically melted in recent decades.

The decision means all U.S. federal agencies now have to ensure nothing they do jeopardizes the bears' survival or the sea ice on which the bears live.

However, polar bear sport hunts bring in about $3 million a year to Nunavut and the Northwest Territories. They form a significant source of income for many Inuit guides, as hunters pay around $30,000 to $40,000 to hunt a polar bear.

American hunters in Nunavut this week began scrambling to find a way to get their polar bear trophies across the border in light of the new threatened status.

'A risk that we were willing to take'

While some had delayed their travel plans as they waited for the U.S. government's decision, others, like Tim Walters of Cornell, Wash., embarked on their northern hunts anyway.

"Yes, it was a concern, very much so, and a risk that we were willing to take," said Walters, who was on a stopover at the Iqaluit airport Thursday after hunting a polar bear in Resolute Bay.

Walters said he came north to experience being in the Arctic, not just to kill a polar bear. At the same time, he said he believes a lot fewer U.S. hunters will want to hunt polar bears in northern Canada because of the import ban.

"I certainly would hope that our government would make some type of exclusion to allow those bears who have been killed up to this point. You cannot put them back on the ice and I see no sense in leaving them somewhere in storage indefinitely."

Ethel Leedy, a 79-year-old hunter from Delta Junction, Alaska, said people must recognize that Inuit have hunting quotas and will still hunt polar bears whether there is a sport hunt or not.

"I think they should let us take them across because the natives are going to take them anyhow," said Leedy. "They get the permits and that's how they have their income, it gives them extra income."

Both Leedy and Walters said their polar bear trophies will stay with Canadian taxidermists until they find a way to get them across the Canada-U.S. border.