Black bears, east & west

Ya, Yosemite Bears are smart!!!

The scary thing, after talking to a local Yosemite Ranger last time I was there, is that the bears are figuring out how to open the bear buckets, steal backpacks, open car doors, etc…those bears are smart.

Perhaps it is habituation, perhaps it's the tourist feeding them, or perhaps, the most likely case is that the bears are in an area where the influx of people visiting is high; b/c of the constant flux of people milling in an out of Yosemite, bears (being all ninja like) are able to watch people perform the same motions day in and day out eg. open car doors to get to food, open backpacks to get to food, open bear buckets to get to food. With all this exposure it seems like the bears pick a thing or two.

Monkey see, Monkey do?

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I don't know…maybe the East coast ones are more timid cause they are more heavily hunted?

All I know is that I have hiked in the SE for several years now and never actually laid eyes on a bear (heard one in the Smokies after dark one time). In contrast I have backpacked once in CA (Sequioa and Kings Canyon NPs last year), and I saw 3 on that trip. Probably just a random coincidence, but still a little wierd.

Matthew – I suspect that your speculation that hunting pressure modifies bear behavior is perceptive. I'm not so sure that the east / west distinction is. For example, bear population in the Adirondacks (east) and Quetico – Superior (midwest) both have reputations for being highly capable camp robbers.

Love to have a wildlife biologist weigh in but think that in the absense of population level behavior modification, any bear will adroitly find and utilize any food source in its territory. In Maine, I don't worry about them at all. Neither does anyone who I know. Hunting, especially as practiced here (baiting)removes individuals that are relatively unafraid of humans.

I am not advocating hunting or baiting – just speculating. Its the topic of rather hot debate here – no need to open that can of worms 'cause I won't argue.

The other variable may be density of recreation (ie how much available food is being carried thru a bear's territory). Part of this may besimple statistical probability – increased chance of crossed paths.

Where the two varibles amplify each other there are more incidents (ie high rec density combined with high bear populations combined with low hunting pressure lead to high incidence).

Interestingly in the east there is a fairly high incidence of bear encounters in suburban environments where the bears are capitalizing on trash cans instead of food bags.

Momma bears teach the baby bears what they have learned.

Bears are quite smart, when given the chance will learn and teach the next generation ;-) Yosemite bears are indeed very habiuated. It may be the amount of people around and easy pickings as well.

A good example might be Rainier's bear policy of 3 strikes and dead – hence the bears learn fast to not come back.

I don't think it is an East Coast/West Coast thing, I think it is a Yosemite thing. In Yellowstone, they suggest keeping your food in your car. In Yosemite, the black bears will rip the top off of your car. I think it is because in Yosemite, they used to feed them (from the dumpsters). They used to do some weird things in Yosemite, like create a big bonfire and then toss it over the side of the cliff (not sure which cliff, but into the valley). I'm sure it looked really cool, but not exactly natural. The other factor is that there are lots and lots of black bear in California because they killed off the Grizzly there (except for on the state flag).

For the East, I've seen bears in the Smokies and in Shenandoah. Out West, one night I heard people banging pots and yelling to scare away bear(s) in Sequoia – my son and I were both too tired and fell back asleep. In Yosemite I did not see or hear any bears – again I was tired – one could have walked on me and I wouldn't have woke up : ), but I did see a bear trap upon my return to my car…

You know what is interesting though, people used to hand feed the bears in the Smokies, and those bears still never got to the point of ripping apart cars. I agree that it is probably an anomaly just in Yosemite and to a lesser extent maybe Sequoia/Kings Canyon.

It's kinda like this documentary I watched on lions a while back. Lions don't normally climb trees, but in this one NP in Africa some of the individual lions started climbing trees. Wierd.

Maybe the bears in Yosemite just pass this behavior down through the generations like an earlier poster suggested.