Working Paper 119 · Herd & HarvestMinnesota · Black bear · 2025 harvest
Minnesota Bear Hunting: 2025 Permit Results, Food Surveys and a Dated Bait Rule
FDR Research Desk · Published Sources: State wildlife-agency public records and FDR analysis
Reading permit-area results alongside the natural-food survey and bait rules. This paper separates historical harvest composition, license-based rates and the reporting limits that matter when comparing hunts.
The harvest, success and food figures below come from the Minnesota DNR report Status of Minnesota Black Bears, 2025. It is a final report to the Bear Committee by Andrew N. Tri, dated February 20, 2026. The report notes that all data are subject to revision.
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What success means in this report
Table 7 measures success as registered harvest divided by licenses sold. Its footnote explains why. Estimates of how many license holders actually hunted are unreliable for a single bear management unit (BMU) in a single year. Statewide harvest per estimated hunter appears separately, in Table 1.
The rates below are therefore license rates. They are not the share of hunters afield who killed a bear.
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Statewide and zone results
Swipe table to see every column
| Area (Table 7) | 2025 | 2024 | Prior five-year average |
|---|---|---|---|
| Statewide (as printed in Table 7; see discrepancy below) | 31% | 44% | 33% |
| Quota areas, excluding area 451 | 46% | 60% | 48% |
| No-quota area | 17% | 27% | 20% |
2025 was below 2024 and near the prior five-year averages.
The no-quota rate was below the quota rate in every year Table 7 lists, 2020 through 2025. The table has no land-area denominator, so it says nothing about bears per square mile.
Two printed figures do not match across tables:
- Table 1 gives 45 percent for 2025 quota harvest per license and 61 percent for 2024. Table 7 gives 46 and 60, respectively. Both tables describe an area 451 exclusion.
- Table 1 lists 3,530 bears and 8,626 licenses for 2024, which divide to 40.9 percent. Table 7 prints 44 for 2024 statewide, the same value Table 1 prints for harvest per estimated hunter.
The report does not explain these differences. The table above reproduces Table 7, not a corrected or independently validated statewide series. In particular, its 2024 statewide value should not be used as harvest per license: the raw counts give 40.9 percent.
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Permit areas: success and drawing odds
Success columns are from Table 7. The lottery column is from Table 5.
Swipe table to see every column
| BMU | 2025 success | 2024 | Prior five-year average | 2025 lottery: lowest preference level with any draw |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 24 | 65% | 65% | 50% | 6 or more (74% drawn) |
| 25 | 64% | 66% | 57% | 4 (28% drawn) |
| 47 | 63% | 68% | 51% | 5 (13% drawn) |
| 12 | 62% | 63% | 52% | 5 (26% drawn) |
| 13 | 57% | 62% | 51% | 3 (25% drawn) |
| 45 | 37% | 57% | 45% | 5 (76% drawn) |
| 51 | 35% | 54% | 43% | 3 (21% drawn) |
| 22 | 1% | 4% | 6% | 1 (100% drawn) |
The four highest 2025 license rates among quota BMUs were 24, 25, 47 and 12. The drawing column shows how those areas compared in the 2025 lottery. Its highest preference category combines level 6 or more with veteran preference, so the 74 percent in BMU 24 is not a separate estimate for ordinary sixth-year applicants.
The report's narrative says 2025 success was at or above the five-year average in every quota BMU except 45 and 51. Table 7 does not support that. It also shows 22, 27, 28, 41 and 46 below their printed averages, as is the combined row for former BMU 26 (now 27 and 28). This article follows the table.
Area 22 is the reverse case. Every applicant was drawn at every preference level, yet license success was 1 percent. The earlier years were 4, 4, 2 and 6 percent in 2024 through 2021, and 14 percent in 2020. In 2025, the Trout Lake unit of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness was added to BMU 22.
A license rate does not measure the value of a wilderness hunt or an individual's prospects.
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Natural food survey
Table 10's 2025 rangewide all-season food index was 71.2, compared with 49 in 2024. Each value is built from survey ratings, with species abundance multiplied by fruit production. It is a survey index, not a count.
The fall index (Table 12) sums production scores for oak, hazel and dogwood.
The SAMPLED rangewide fall index was 7.1 in 2025 versus 5.5 in 2024. The report used 26 surveys for its 2025 rangewide food estimates.
The rangewide survey count is not the sum of the regions, because some border surveys count toward more than one region.
The report describes 2025 fall foods as average in every region except the west-central, where they were above average.
The report's text also describes summer foods in two ways that conflict. It calls them above the 40-year average in all regions, and also exceptionally poor across the state. This article does not characterize 2025 summer foods.
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Bait station rule
Minnesota Rules 6232.3200, as published electronically April 16, 2026, provides the following.
The rule prohibits establishing a bear bait station in quota area 22 and sets registration, sign, timing and distance requirements for bait stations. Area 22's 1 percent license rate and its bait ban appear side by side, but neither source establishes that the ban caused the rate. This is a description of the dated rule text, not a complete season-rule guide.
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Not covered here
Season dates, quotas and license procedures are not covered here. See the DNR bear hunting page and that year's regulations.
Source limit: BMU rates use licenses as the denominator, not hunters afield. The food index is a small survey. The report contains unresolved table and narrative discrepancies described above.
NOTES AND SOURCES
- Minnesota Department of Natural Resources harvest report. The source is linked in the article body. Retrieved October 8, 2026.
- Minnesota Department of Natural Resources source page. The source is linked in the article body. Retrieved October 8, 2026.
- Minnesota Office of the Revisor of Statutes source page. The source is linked in the article body. Retrieved October 8, 2026.
- MEASURED labels refer to agency-reported registrations and license counts. Food-survey indices are SAMPLED. Percentages recomputed from reported counts are DERIVED. Population estimates are agency models, not complete counts. Denominators and reporting years remain specific to each comparison.
Fully Drawn Research is an independent data analysis desk, not affiliated with any state wildlife agency, transportation agency, mapping provider or outfitter. Fully Drawn Research analysis of public agency reports. Historical harvest results describe the reporting scope stated in each source. They do not forecast an individual hunt. Check the agency’s current regulations before hunting.
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