When Bears Visit the Suburbs

Drought is contributing to a record number of bear incidents in the Western United States, according to a story in today's USA Today. Bears have been becoming more and more familiar to Americans in recent years for a variety of reasons, independent of drought. People are increasingly building homes in remote areas, as the suburban sprawl extends ever outward. And the woods themselves -- in many parts of the country -- are expanding to meet the suburbs, as farmland cleared a century ago reverts to woodland.

Tack on the propensity to feed birds (bears love bird seed), cook outdoors (BBQ grease smells great to them) and leave trash at the curb (trash is even better than grilled meat) and you have all the ingredients for suburban bears. Depending on the species of bear, this development is more or less dangerous. Black bear, common in the East, are relatively gentle and skittish and are more apt to run from a loud noise.

Grizzlies, out west, of course, are more prone to violence. But the potential for violence is stronger if bears associated humans with food -- which is why wildlife experts are uniform in their advice: If you live in the woods, take care not to attract bears unwittingly with garbage, bird seed, barbecues and the like.

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