Bear the Responsibility
The Facts that lead to problems with bears...
- Easy access (fruit bearing trees, garbage, birdseed, compost to name the major sources).
- Droughts & fires.
- Urban spread of human occupied land reduces wild habitat.
- Remaining wild habitat is increasingly used for human recreation.
Access to unnatural food sources, will result in a larger reproduction rate in bears. Did you know that the reproduction cycle of bears depends on their physical condition?
A female bear gets bred in June, but the fertilized eggs remain in stasis until she goes into hibernation in early winter. Her body condition will determine how many eggs will get imbedded. In normal times it will be one or two, in really good years up to 4 and in bad years none.
By providing human sourced feed we constantly create good years and artificially raise bear numbers in urban areas.
What we can do...
- Removal or fencing of all fruit bearing trees and bushes on human occupied land.
- Gleaning programs to ensure timely harvesting of fruit.
- Bear proof garbage storage and good municipal policies for regular garbage pickup.
- Municipalities and Government should lead by example and not plant fruit trees on town or government land unless properly managed.
- Programs to seed natural food sources on crownland adjacent to urban areas to provide wildlife with abundant natural food sources. This can go hand in hand with replanting areas that have been logged.
