Bears Oh My
Every Spring juvenile boar bears are forced out on their own. As they search for a new home range they often wander through territory that is traditionally not bear country such was the case this weekend in Raleigh and parts of Durham. Much of the news is around town is the bear or bears depending on who you talk to. Today many people had to ask me about the bears and my thoughts on where they came from and how they got here.
For the most part if the bears are left alone they’ll just travel through the area and get to a place more suited for bears then the urban areas around Raleigh. That is the approach that the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission takes and they’ll not respond unless a bear gets stuck. How does a bear get stuck? Often being chased by people or forced to start running in urban areas. They often will find a tree and climb up it. Sometimes people can back off and it will come down and continue on its way. Putting the bear under stress or cornering it will only encourage an altercation.
One of the news reports from this weekend reported that one citizen went and got a shotgun but by the time he returned the bear was gone. I would not suggest that anyone shoot a bear in an urban area, or out of season without good cause. Walking through your yard is not enough provocation to kill a bear. Additionally a wounded bear in the wild makes us with experience pucker never mind having it in a urban area where it could easily encounter a person or multiple people.
Finally one of the hardest things to do is to judge how big a bear is. Reports of a hundred pound bear and a two hundred pound bear are more then likely the same bear. If I’ve learned anything from being in hunt camps the average person can not accurately judge the size of a bear. The fear factor associated with seeing a bear tends to take away the ability to judge the size of the bear. Reports that this is a sow (200lb) bear with a cub (100lb) is highly unlikely. Cubs born this winter will not weigh more then 50lbs, even during the fall hunting season cubs don’t often hit 100lbs.
My advice if you encounter a bear on your way out of your subdivision tomorrow give him space.
Story by Dan McLaughlin AKA Moose
“Walking through your yard is not enough provocation to kill a bear”
Maybe not your yard, and good for you. I have three small children who play outside. If there was a bear wandering through my yard for long enough to get my 30-06 out of the gun safe there would be one less bear in Durham.
And, yes, I understand how far a bullet goes.
-C
Comment by C — May 28, 2008 @ 8:23 am
Thanks C for your comment. Certainly if your children are in danger I have no issue with a person taking steps to protect them. With that being said if the kids are in the house or otherwise out of harms way I feel pretty confident in saying that an individual will be in a heap of trouble for shooting a bear in an urban area. Just having an understanding or knowledge of safely handling a gun is not enough. Killing a bear instantly with a rifle is not an easy task and in my experience it is not unusual for a bear to cover a hundred or more yards after being lethally shot. In the wilderness this is not a big deal in an urban area it is huge and could put a lot of other people at risk.
Wildlife in urban areas is an issue I think we’ll see more and more problems as animal populations increase and urban sprawl continues. Most of the issues around here deal with foxes, raccoons, opossums, deer, etc. Bear problems are pretty rare and isolated for the most part to this time of the year. Coyotes are really taking off in the Raleigh Durham area are going to be a much bigger issue once they get use to people the danger to kids especially will be much greater then the bear.
I really think the question we need to have answered by the folks at the state that manager the bear is, Does the state plan to take any steps to control the areas where the bear repopulates or is the entire state open for bear re population?
-Moose-
Comment by Moose — May 28, 2008 @ 12:14 pm
This is a prickly situation, isn’t it? Bears (and other predators) in urban areas are coming more and more common - and is just a recipe for bad news.
As for judging a bear - that’s dang near impossible!
The bear my brother shot this year, we estimated at 150 pounds, but have no clue how close we were. It was a small sow that must have been on her first year by herself. We saw three bears this season and couldn’t tell if any one bear was bigger than the others.
Comment by Tom Sorenson — May 28, 2008 @ 5:44 pm