Musings Inspired by My Run-In with a Bear

By John Horgan | July 25, 2011 | 4

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I live in Cold Spring, New York, where the Hudson River winds through steep, densely wooded hills. Last Friday I went jogging early, to beat the expected 100-degree heat. I ran down a village road and onto a path zigzagging up the side of Mount Taurus, a rock hump north of town. Normally on a sunny summer morning I’d see some hikers, but the heat was apparently deterring them. I was huffing along in my usual daze when I spotted a large black object heading toward me. I stopped, and it stopped, about 20 feet away. Fur black and shiny as asphalt. Maybe 200 pounds. We locked eyes, each waiting for the other to make a move.

This wasn’t my first encounter with a black bear. One morning eight years ago I was letting my dog Merlin, who was then barely a year old, out the back door for his morning constitutional when he froze, peed all over the deck and scrambled back inside the house. I was chiding him for his bad behavior when I noticed that a couple of pole-mounted birdfeeders in the backyard had been torn down and smashed into pieces. I was pondering that mystery when a huge black bear—easily 400 pounds—lumbered out from behind a boulder at the edge of our yard, looked me over coolly and waddled back into the woods.

I’d heard about this fellow. He had been knocking over garbage cans and birdfeeders for the previous week or so, scaring people and their dogs. I was nonetheless dismayed when, a week later, a farmer in my town shot and killed the bear after he busted into the farmer’s chicken coop. (Merlin’s reaction to the bear, which he never actually saw, still fascinates me: How could a one-year-old dog who had never encountered a bear know from merely its smell that it was something to be feared? Are dogs born with that genetic capacity?)

The bear I encountered last Friday was much smaller and cuter than the brute that terrified Merlin, so much so that I assume it was a she. Vaguely remembering that a display of aggression can make bears back off, I yelled, "Hey!" and thrust my arms up. She instantly wheeled away from me and ran back up the path. When I strolled after her, she plunged off the path, crashing through the underbrush and uttering a mournful moan that reminded me of Chewbacca, the hirsute Star Wars character. I felt guilty for scaring her—and glad when she bounded up the mountain and away from a nearby highway.

Humans have long felt this ambivalence—half fear, half affection—toward black bears. Ursus americanus is the most common species of bear in the world. As this well-sourced Wikipedia entry notes, there are as many as a half million in North America, ranging from Canada as far south as Mexico. Black bears are ordinarily shy, but some have become habituated to humans in heavily populated areas, such as New York and New Jersey, and have boldly foraged for garbage and other food. Over the objections of animal-rights groups, New Jersey recently legalized hunting bears, which is also permitted in 27 other states.

I own a book, Man the Hunted (Westview Press 2009), by the anthropologists Donna Hart and Robert Sussman, which says that our ancestors, far from being fearsome predators, were fearful prey; our big brains and sociality may have evolved in part as adaptations that helped us avoid being eaten. Hart and Sussman focus for the most parts on lions, tigers and other big cats, but they note that bears can kill humans too. Although not nearly as dangerous (or large) as polar bears or grizzlies, black bears killed 34 people in North America in the 20th century, according to Hart and Sussman, and left other victims alive but grievously wounded.

Of course, humans have slaughtered countless black bears for their meat or skin or just for fun. Wade Hampton, a Confederate General and politician, personally shot or stabbed to death more than 300 black bears. Nowadays, almost 500,000 bear-hunting licenses are issued every year in the U.S. Between 1988 and 1992, Americans "harvested" almost more than 18,000 black bears a year, according to Wikipedia. We also imperil bears in less direct ways. Global warming, caused by our profligate consumption of fossil fuels, is reportedly disrupting the food sources and hibernation patterns of black bears.

Meanwhile, we feel a mawkish, sentimental affection for black bears, or at least for their fictional representations. Winnie the Pooh, the beloved storybook character, who is starring in a new film, was based on a female black bear named Winnipeg, who lived in a London zoo in the early 20th century. Smokey Bear, the popular mascot of the U.S. Forest Service, was named after a bear cub who survived a forest fire in New Mexico in 1950. Our schizoid attitude toward bears is embodied in the teddy bear, which is named after Teddy Roosevelt, an avid hunter of bears.

In his 1968 sci-fi novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (made into the awesome 1982 film Blade Runner), Philip K. Dick imagines a dystopia in which nuclear radiation has destroyed virtually all creatures other than humans. The protagonist is overcome with joy when he finds a spider. A spider! I’m confident that humanity can avoid turning the planet into a barren wasteland, devoid of wildlife. But I’m glad I live in a world where you can still run into a bear in the woods.

Photo by Chuck Tague courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Tags: bears

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4 Comments

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1. HankFox 11:44 am 07/25/2011

I got used to seeing black bears in California’s Eastern Sierras where I once lived. A couple of them came through my yard on a regular basis.

A couple of years ago, a bear was spotted in a rural area of Upstate New York where I now live. A California friend and I had just pulled into a parking spot near a woodsy area where I frequently walked my dog, when a car screeched to a halt behind me. The driver yelled out "Hey, they saw a bear go in there not ten minutes ago!" The expression on the guy’s face was priceless when both of us simultaneously yelled back "All riiiiight!" and turned to walk into the woods.
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2. solspot 6:58 pm 07/27/2011

John,
I respect the many wild animals where I live in the hills of Northwest New Jersey. My neighbors and I try to foster this attitude of respect in our children. But your maudlin reverie shows a lack of understanding of the dangerous nature of the prolific and unpredictable black bear. Your dog’s reaction was correct; get away from the bear. Your attempt to scare the bear, and your admission that you "strolled after her" exhibits a level of ignorance with a touch of insanity. Never challenge or follow a bear, especially a female!

Long-time residents, especially farmers, understand that bear populations must be controlled. The implication that hunting is a "fun sport" never occurred to any resident who has seen the effects of bear overpopulation. In the 1980s, bears migrated into North Jersey because there was no hunting here. In only 15 years, the population boomed because each female can have 2 or 3 cubs EVERY year. Poor state management (hunting bans) leads to increasing incidents of pet killings, sheep and goat slaughter, and threats to children walking home from school.

Yes, it’s great to enjoy nature. But please encourage your readers to get educated about the true nature of bears and the need for hunting as population control. Then, if they run into a bear in the woods, you may have helped them to avoid becoming one of the bear fatalities in the 21st century.
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3. briseboy 6:00 pm 08/2/2011

There is significant misrepresentation in the above comment.
The black bear is long habituated to avoid confrontation with:
a)wolf, an apex predator that, unlike dogs, quickly responds by chase, especially where 2 or more wolves occur.
b)humans for thousands of years on this continent.
c)other large animals with low tolerance for its presence, including grizzlies, a much larger and more muscular species.

In cases of black bear violence, attractants such as menses or food aromas has been involved. In these cases, the human was made invisible by a tent or sleeping bag, or attempted to retake food from the bear. A few cases of stalking behavior have occurred during the fall hyperphagic period; it has been broken off when the human halts and confronts the bear.

The commentor’s scaremongering tactic contains an agenda easily observed, is inaccurate and offensive; such postings need removal from SA or other scientifically-based information exchange.

Ursus Americanus mothers threaten to protect cubs. In my field studies, we have found some females with cubs to use other strategies, as, for instance, one whose territory has been intruded upon by suburban sprawl: She teaches (there is considerable literature on this) her successive cubs avoidance, even when accidentally split from them.
As with bears in many parts of Asia, bears whose habitats suffer human incursion often shift to nocturnal foraging.
The commentor intends to deceive you concerning reproduction. Black bears have one or two cubs, depending upon whether their home territory supports sufficient forage food (along with varying individual fertility and other variables), the cubs remain for three to four years with the mother, during which time she does not accept mating.
Since it is difficult to census bears (we do so here in part through tracking methods), it is difficult to establish cub mortality. Here we see as much as 30%, due to poaching and other human activity affecting offspring dispersal.
There can be population saturation in areas where forest and terrain are not conducive to human hunting/predation. However, irregular territories of around 10 mi.sq. means that bears do NOT occur in large numbers anywhere. Some "population control" occurs through male/cub interaction.

Specific actions are recommended when encountering specific animals. Adults are capable of instructing children in these actions. Forest Service and other literature identifies these.

The above comment is a rather hysterical post by either a hunting advocate, or uninformed urban dweller.
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4. solspot 8:07 pm 08/2/2011

@briseboy
Name calling and baiting attacks are not a very scientific response; and my scientific credentials are quite substantial. But thank you for the opportunity to address your’s and John Horgan’s implied demonization of hunting as a necessary method of population control.

The average black bear litter is two cubs; some have up to 6 cubs. The average wild sow lives 18 years; some live 30+ years. Over that time, each female has an average of 10 surviving cubs, so simple math shows exponential growth and territory expansion of uncontrolled populations in less than 20 years. If they are not allowed to expand their territory, overpopulation leads to aggressive behavior, food shortages and starvation.

Since John Horgan worked in New Jersey, let’s examine the facts there. How do New Jersey officials handle bears who try to expand their territory due to overpopulation? They continue to return wandering bears to the overpopulated Northwest counties! Even worse, if the bears migrate out of overpopulated rural areas of New York and Pennsylvania, and they are captured in New Jersey, they are "returned to their home" in (where else?) overpopulated Northwest NJ counties.

Recent NJ university studies show that those who oppose hunting as a method of population control are usually young, uninformed city dwellers. Please, teach THEM how to interact with the bears! When officials allow unfettered territorial expansion of bears into cities, then I will gladly agree to a ban on hunting as a method of population control. Until you deal with bear behavior in your back yard, eating your pets, spare me the propaganda that you gleaned from Forest service literature.
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