Two Cornell students prompted disgust after they slaughtered an 120lb black bear and skinned it in their dorm.
The undergraduates brought the carcass into a communal kitchen at Ganędagǫ: Hall, a residence on North Campus last week.
They then butchered the animal and stored portions of the meat in freezer bags.
Photos of the scene rapidly appeared on Reddit, Sidechat, and Facebook groups, showcasing the bear’s partially skinned body placed on a camouflage tarp.
In a Sidechat thread shared by the Cornell Daily Sun, a photo showed the meat on the tarp, with one user joking, ‘this is why you can’t eat at everybody’s house,’ and another noting, ‘Wait till people find out where the dining hall food comes from.’
Cornell officials confirmed the students possessed valid New York State hunting licenses and the bear had been legally taken in Region 4, which includes parts of the Catskills and Hudson Valley where the early firearms season began on September 6.
Region 4 covers several counties in the northern Catskills and it lies to the east of Region 7, where Cornell is located.
Region 4’s early firearms black bear hunting season opened Saturday, Sept. 6.
Two Cornell students prompted disgust after they slaughtered an 120lb bear and skinned it in their dorm
‘This is why you can’t eat at everybody’s house,’ one student joked on Sidechat after images of the bear began circulating online
The New York Department of Environmental Conservation dispatched an investigator to the campus on Sunday, who confirmed the bear was lawfully harvested and that no state rules were breached.
Although a police report was filed after a complaint, no charges were issued.
New York allows early bear hunting in the Catskill Mountains from September 6 to September 21, though state regulations stipulate hunters ‘may not shoot a cub or a bear that should be known to be a cub’.
Much of the concern on campus centered not on the hunt itself but on the decision to process the animal in a shared dorm kitchen.
Students expressed concerns about potential health hazards, pointing out that black bears can harbor parasites like trichinosis, and criticized using communal areas for butchering.
In response to the incident, the kitchen was closed ‘until further notice.’
The case highlighted an unusual gap in university rules.
Cornell’s Student Code of Conduct does not specifically address the transportation or processing of wild game on campus, leaving administrators to acknowledge that while the incident unsettled many, it did not break school policy.
The undergraduates processed it inside Ganędagǫ: Hall, a residence hall on North Campus
Initial confusion also stemmed from the fact that bear season in Tompkins County, where Ithaca is located, does not begin until October 1.
The DEC clarified that the animal had been legally taken in Region 4 and then transported to campus.
Cornell’s mascot is Touchdown, a live bear that acts as the university’s unofficial ‘Big Red Bear,’ making the incident resonate in an especially surreal way on campus.
Online, condemnation came quickly. One Reddit user wrote, ‘I am a fan of hunting. But this kid needs to see someone and if protesting is a suspendable [sic] offense, this should be also……. This is not okay.’
On Facebook, commenters called the act ‘outrageous’ and ‘disturbing,’ while others said simply, ‘People are just weird!!!!’ or ‘Shame on you.’
Another argued, ‘It’s one thing to kill a bear in self-defense, but it’s a whole different issue when you hunt down a bear to kill it and eat it. Why? Was Walmart out of meat?’
Others took a lighter approach, making jokes about Cornell’s bear tradition.
‘I heard Cornell was considering a mascot-change…but this is NOT the proper way to go about it,’ one wrote.
Cornell’s athletics teams are known as the Big Red, and while the school has no official mascot, students and fans have long embraced the Touchdown the bear as its symbol
Another quipped, ‘A whole new meaning to BYOB.’
While social media speculation suggested the animal was a cub, the DEC’s findings confirmed that it was not and that no wildlife violations had occurred.
Daily Mail has contacted Cornell for comment.
