Bears in the neighborhoods

Ursus americana is in the neighborhood, and some citizens are not pleased. Black bears, and in some places, grizzlies, are searching for anything edible to fill their bellies before hibernation. Their quest for forage is called hyperphagia. Prior to hibernation, bears increase caloric intake, double or tripling calories, and grizzly bears, Ursus arctos horribilis, may gain as much as 400 pounds. During the food fest, bears amble into towns across the West for natural fodder, and bear-human interactions show that bears sometimes find humans akin to café waiters who provide delectables from fruit trees, vegetable gardens, chicken coops, bird feeders and Dumpsters. Leaders in various Mountain West communities are taking steps to prevent or discourage bears from becoming habituated to neighborhoods and rural residences, yet it takes extra effort by humans keep foraging animals away: Pick remaining fruit and rake fallen fruit that has fallen on the ground; harvest all remaining edibles from vegetable gardens and remove rotting vegetation; take bird feeders inside; lock up garbage bins and Dumpsters. In October alone, bear sightings and altercations in the Northwest have become nearly daily occurrences. In mid October, as noted by the Montana Fish Wildlife and Parks, a male grizzly bear got into a chicken coop near Kalispell. A man shot and killed the bear. In another incident, a female grizzly was shot and killed near a Columbia Falls property owner’s chicken coop. Near Bigfork, a bird hunter shot a sow grizzly in the eye— she and her cub were tracked by wildlife officials and captured so that the injured sow’s eye could be removed by a veterinarian. Both bears are back in the wild. Wyoming Game and Fish captured and relocated a grizzly bear in late October that damaged a grain-storage outbuilding west of Cody. In September, a bow hunter was attacked by a grizzly when the archer sought a bull elk he’d shot near the Island Park area of central-eastern Idaho. In 2011 alone, there were 83 different incidents in the Northern Rockies in which grizzly bears charged humans—and two fatalities just outside Yellowstone National Park. Two inside the park occured in 2010. Wildlife experts won’t speculate as to which incidents were avoidable and instead point to measures that people can take to lessen conflicts. The word from Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks is “Being bear-friendly in Montana is a commitment. It may mean sacrificing the opportunity to see a bear or take pictures of it—for the welfare of the bear. It means taking steps to prevent bears from finding sources of food on your property or when you are out camping.” Once a bear is food-trained, it is often impossible to un-train them. That is why biologists so often say a fed bear is a dead bear. Your vigilance in keeping your residence and outdoor camps ‘Bear Friendly’ can make all the difference in helping keep grizzly and black bears wild and free.” While basic yard maintenance should un-invite frequent wild visitors, some people are tackling the garbage disposal devices by trying to outsmart bears. One organization, the Living With Wildlife Foundation, helps people access and implement into wildlife barriers. The foundation began in 2003 after organizer Patti Sowka discovered that there was no single place listing bear-resistant products. “There are many solutions to problems between people and bears,” says Sowka from the LWWF organization’s headquarters in Condon, Mont. “We have created and offered Resource Guides for living among bears, mountain lions, wolves, coyotes and bobcats.” The nonpartisan, nonpolitical foundation provides details on easy solutions for people living where wildlife live or travel. “We see a push toward self-sustaining lifestyles,” Sowka notes. “Sustainable practices like backyard composting, raising pigs and chickens becomes a huge issue for predators. We are losing more bears now to chicken coops!” “Chickens,” according to Montana FWP’s bear expert Jamie Jonkel, “are the new garbage,” since the fowl are easily to corner in chicken coops and provide a delicious alternative to scavenged chow. Solutions include electric fencing, which can be erected in a few hours. Whether permanent or temporary, it can teach predators that the zap of an electric fence is unpleasant. Solar-powered electric fencing has been used to great success as well. Sowka said the resource guides “have gone viral. People on many continents are downloading the guides to use on a variety of wild animals. Even in Africa, we’ve seen the guides used to deal with (aggressive) wild monkeys. We are trying to find on-the-ground solutions for people dealing with wildlife.” One testing ground for various items is the West Yellowstone, Mont. Grizzly and Wolf Discovery Center, where bears are used to assess access into garbage cans. For a decade, one grizzly named Kobuk has made a career at busting open bins. “Bears approach a bear-resistant container, tip it over, play with it and move on,” said Bill Lavelle, a Whitefish resident and board member of LWWF. “They’re looking for quick and fast food rewards—an unsecured container.” Lavelle is currently assisting the City of Whitefish assess bear-resistant Dumpsters, noting that nothing is truly bear proof. Even in a busy city, there are bears in town. “Whitefish now has a city ordinance that demands that people on the north side of town, north of the train tracks keep garbage cans inside until day of pick up,” says Lavelle. “We have certain neighborhoods where if tomorrow is pick-up day, I guarantee that tonight if people put out their garbage, bears will be getting into the garbage.” Lavell first became interested in preventing bears from accessing trash about 15 years ago. As a maintenance crewmember at Ptarmigan Village lodging facility on Big Mountain, he witnessed many a happy bear in the garbage. “One night I saw tourists watching a plastic Dumpster,” he recounts. “The lid was caved in and two black bear cubs were inside the Dumpster. The cub’s mother started pushing on the Dumpster, which had wheels on it, and it rolled downhill. It was hysterical to watch. But it was a nightmare to pull that Dumpster back uphill and clean up the garbage.” He began a one-man campaign to find non-plastic Dumpster lids, noting that “plastic lids even with locking bars do not keep bears out.” As a board member of Living With Wildlife, he witnesses Kobuk at work and advocates bear-resistant containers. He also volunteers with the Whitefish Police Dept., notifying homeowners of the dangers in leaving garbage out overnight. “If I see garbage cans outside, I have warnings from the Whitefish P.D. to leave on doors,” he says. “The police can issue citations of up to $500 for leaving out bear attractants.” Lavell says the big push for backyard chickens have created another very attractive food source for bears. “You are inviting a bear to your house by leaving out garbage or having a chicken coop,” he said. “We can coexist, however. There are things we can do like electrify your coop. Defenders of Wildlife even has an incentive up to $500 to add electric fencing to your chicken coop.” Erin Edge is the Rockies and Plains Associate for Defenders of Wildlife in Missoula, and writes, “For long-term grizzly bear recovery to be successful, we will have to find ways to coexist. That’s why Defenders continues working hard to increase tolerance on the lands where this great bear resides. This year we implemented an electric fencing incentive program that has proven to be very effective at reducing conflicts between people and bears.” In reducing the food sources, humans reduce the potential for conflicts that result in injury or death to humans and bears. Even so, the Montana FWP surveys for the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem found that conflicts increased by 29 percent in the last decade and 40 percent in the past five years—a significant increase due to more human development and fluctuations in natural food sources. According to U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Bear Recovery Coordinator Chris Servheen, the number of fatalities from black bear attacks in North America has increased 86 percent since 1960. Between 1900 and 2009, a total of 63 people died at the claws and teeth of black bears. He cites a 2011 study published in the Journal of Wildlife Management that shows that conflict levels in the fall are related to food or lack of wild food such as a poor huckleberry crop or weak whitebark pine yield. “Most bears involved in fatal attacks were not known to have a history of association with people,” Servheen noted during a presentation at University of Montana. “Most fatal attacks involved people who were alone. In 38 percent of the fatal attacks, human food or garbage was present.” Servheen and other researchers note that today there are three times more grizzly bears in the Northern Rockies than in 1975, and the forecast is for more encounters, but humans can alter that course by lessening the attractive fodder in their yards and neighborhoods. “Bear Friendly,” notes Montana FWP, “means allowing every bear to retain its wild and free nature.”