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Baiting bears for hunting isn't a common practice, says Capt. Woody Lipps of the U.S. Forest Service, but authorities have seen a recent increase in baiting.

A Pembroke man who was baiting bears at a popular Giles County recreation area pleaded guilty to six charges last week in federal court in Roanoke.

Merrill Conley, 54, was caught Oct. 23 baiting bear at the Cascades Recreation Area, according to Capt. Woody Lipps of the U.S. Forest Service. Conley's actions had been under investigation for several weeks, Lipps said.

Conley pleaded guilty April 2 to charges of illegally baiting bears, knowingly hunting in a baited place, knowingly allowing a juvenile to hunt in a baited place, maintaining an illegal trail on national forest land, providing false information to a law enforcement officer and littering.

Violation of each state regulation is punishable by up to six months in jail and a $5,000 fine, Lipps said.

Through a plea agreement, Conley was able to avoid jail time, Lipps said. Conley was ordered to pay more than $2,700 in fines and court costs, including restitution for illegally killing a black bear and for the restoration of the trail he had created into the forest at the recreation area, Lipps said.

Conley was banned from hunting for one year and from the National Forest for five years. He must spend two years on probation and had to forfeit two cameras and a crossbow, Lipps said. He also has to attend a hunter safety course within the next year.

"Two bears were actually killed that we know of," Lipps said.

Conley and an unidentified teenage boy would have someone drop them off in the Cascades parking lot, then would follow a homemade trail to an area where they would bait and then shoot the bears, Lipps said.

It's legal to hunt on national forest land but not in recreation areas and not to bait the animals, Lipps said.

"They were within what we consider to be the recreation area boundary," he said.

"This type of activity near a recreation area like the Cascades presents a safety issue for visitors," said Teddy Mullins, a law enforcement officer with the U.S. Forest Service. "In this case, it brought a number of bears into an area with a lot of people, and when bears smell food and people they can begin to associate food with people."

Baiting bears for hunting isn't a common practice, Lipps said, but authorities have seen a recent increase in baiting.

It doesn't appear there has been an increase in bear activity at the Cascades as a result of the baiting, Lipps said, and no interaction between people and bears has been reported.

"Certainly there are bear in that area anyway," Lipps said, but they tend to avoid people unless they begin to associate people with food. "I've said before a fed bear is a dead bear."

"Bears don't care about anything but food when they get addicted to food from people," Mullins said.

Rangers advise anyone who visits a park where bears may live to be careful not to leave food out.

In Virginia, it's a violation of state regulations to feed deer between Sept. 1 and Jan. 3 and to feed bear anytime and on any land, Lipps said.