As more than 600,000 hunters prepare for Wisconsin’s firearms deer-hunting opener Nov. 21, state lawmakers in Madison are pressing ahead with a plan that could insulate hunters from surveillance by animal-rights activists.

The proposal, which would expand the state’s definition of illegal hunter harassment, is a response to tactics employed this fall by a convicted eco-terrorist who says he’s trying to protect bear-hunting dogs from wolf attacks.

Backers of the proposed legislation, which appears to have strong support among lawmakers, argue that the changes are necessary to protect law-abiding hunters from intimidation and harassment by anti-hunting groups intent on scuttling hunters’ efforts. Opponents say the effort would squelch the public’s ability to monitor hunting on public lands for illegal, unethical and inhumane activities.

The topic might come up at deer camps as hunters begin the state’s nine-day gun season Nov. 21, although they appear unlikely to be affected this fall. The leader of the group at the center of the controversy, Wolf Patrol, says he’s withdrawn previous plans to be out in force during the deer season; the earliest the proposed law could become effective is next year.

But the issue is well-known to many of the state’s roughly 100,000 bear hunters.

HUNTERS FILMED

Earlier this year, animal-rights activist Rod Coronado and his group, Wolf Patrol (WolfPatrol.org), began videotaping hunters preparing for bear-hunting season by setting out bait and training hounds to pursue bears — practices legal in Wisconsin — and putting some of the footage on the Internet.

The principal supporter of the proposed legislation is state Rep. Adam Jarchow, R-Balsam Lake, whose district stretches along the Minnesota-Wisconsin border from Grantsburg to the Twin Cities metro area.

Jarchow, a deer hunter, said bear hunters began contacting him immediately with concerns.

“I have to admit that the stories I heard were, well, unbelievable at first,” Jarchow said. “They parked outside one hunter’s driveway and followed him into the woods. But then as these stories kept coming in and law enforcement began getting involved, I realized this was really happening.”

Jarchow introduced what he called the “Right to Hunt Act,” which would expand Wisconsin’s existing laws that make it illegal to harass hunters operating legally. Numerous states have such laws, including Minnesota.

The bill seeks to expand current law to include hunting preparations, such as dog training, target shooting and setting up hunting stands or bait stations. Among the prohibited activities: “Maintaining a visual or physical proximity … approaching or confronting the person … photographing, videotaping, audiotaping, or through other electronic means, monitoring or recording the activities” of a hunter.

Some critics have seized on those prohibitions as restrictions of First Amendment freedoms, but Jarchow says that’s not the case.

“If you only read that part of it, sure, but you have to do those things with the intent of obstructing a hunter or hunting-related activities,” said Jarchow, a lawyer.

Would someone be prohibited from, say, recording a neighbor suspected of poaching? “Absolutely, positively no,” he said. “Our lawyers have said the law is clear: It only protects legal hunting.”

BEAR HUNTS TARGETED

Law enforcement officials have told lawmakers that Wolf Patrol’s current tactics don’t appear to break any laws — in part because the group focused its efforts on hunters setting out bear bait and training hounds during the summer, when such activities are allowed but the fall hunting season had not yet begun.

The group previously focused on wolves but, when a federal judge overturned wolf hunting and trapping seasons in Great Lakes states, Wolf Patrol turned its attention to bear hunting.

With the state’s black bear population estimated at 22,000 and growing, the Wisconsin DNR has expanded bear hunting — the only population management tool in the kit of wildlife managers — in recent years. Hunters in Wisconsin now kill more bears — 4,526 in 2014 — than those in any other state.

Like Minnesota, bear baiting — setting out food or scent — is legal in Wisconsin. Unlike Minnesota, which restricts baiting to the weeks preceding the September hunting opener, Wisconsin allows baiting to begin in April, and hunters aren’t limited by how many bait sites they can establish. And unlike Minnesota, Wisconsin allows hunters to use hounds to track and chase bears, which usually flee up a tree, where they are shot.

Bear hunters running hounds are a subgroup of bear hunters. Last year, 995 bears were killed by hunters using dogs and bait, compared with 3,952 by hunters using only bait.

In recent years, Wisconsin has seen an increase in bear hounds killed by wolves. From 2002 to 2011, an average of 15 hunting dogs were killed by wolves, according to the DNR. Last year, 22 hunting dogs were killed by wolves, and the same number had been killed so far this year by Sept. 20. The bear-hunting season ended Oct. 13, but some hunters are expected to return to the woods with their dogs to hunt coyotes after the deer-hunting season ends.

It’s the dog deaths that are the focus of Wolf Patrol. Coronado said he believes wolves become accustomed to feeding at bear bait sites and protect the territory from intruders, including dogs.

The entire practice is unethical and inhumane, he said, and he wants baiting curtailed and hounding banned from at least public lands, such as the vast tracts of the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest in northern Wisconsin, a hub of bear hunting.

“This doesn’t have anything to do with hunter harassment,” he said of the proposed law. “There are ample laws in place to protect hunters. Essentially, they just want their behavior hidden. We’re just trying to document it.”

CONVICTED ECO-TERRORIST

“I don’t buy that for a minute,” Jarchow said in response to Coronado’s comments. “Keep in mind this is a guy who tried to blow up a laboratory in Michigan. When you have that kind of guy out there following hunters, it’s not just obnoxious — it’s dangerous.”

Coronado’s background of illegal activities isn’t in dispute.

A convicted felon, he was jailed in connection with an arson attack on a Michigan State University research laboratory. The attack was part of an operation under the banner of the Animal Liberation Front, a group described by senior FBI officials as a “serious domestic terrorist threat” and of which Coronado was an activist.

A Michigan resident, Coronado, 49, acknowledges his past is a presence in the current controversy.

“Of course my history is a huge part of it,” he said in an interview with the Pioneer Press. “It’s all in the legal record. It reflects on anything I do, ever since I got out of prison. But the key thing is that’s in the past. I’ve had a conversion to want to do things more sustainably and productively.”

He insists he’s not anti-hunting and said he has returned to bow hunting deer, something he did as a youth. (By law, he’s prohibited from carrying a firearm, but not a bow and arrow.)

Jarchow said his proposed restrictions have widespread support from Republicans and some support from Democrats in Madison. He said he’s confident the bill will become law.

It’s unclear how the potential law could affect Coronado’s tactics. On its website, the group said the proposed law would outlaw tactics it used in 2014 to record an illegally set wolf trap.

But last week Coronado said, “We’re going to continue doing what we’re doing, and this law won’t affect our actions one bit.”