As of last Thursday, Bryce canyon has shut down a majority of its backcountry south of the right fork of swamp canyon. I was told it was shut down because of an incident where someone who was sleeping with food in their tent was "attacked" when a black bear swiped at her tent, scratching her.
Bryce Canyon's response was to completely shut down the trails and backcountry campsites on the south side of the park to all overnight AND day use, and from my understanding they are trying to track down and relocate the bear(s).
I personally do not agree with the parks actions in this case. How does shutting down the trails, especially for day use, help anything?!?! Requiring people to carry bear spray and bear canisters and requiring them to read/watch a presentation on proper bear country etiquette and making sure that people are informed that they are entering the bears "home" are ways to help prevent incidents, but there will be incidents no matter what we do as long as people are in bear territory. Again, shutting down the backcountry DOES NOT FIX ANYTHING!!!
If this happened in somewhere where bears are part of the parks culture (yosemite…) there would have been public uproar. On top of that, it took them till today to put up a park alert on their website, and there has been no official news releases or any news articles covering this.
