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Learning about the 'bear' necessities

Last June, I attended a kayaking symposium. The Friday evening speaker was Mike McIntosh, who operates Bear With Us. At first, I figured I didn’t need to go to the lecture. After all, I’ve been living in the bush for 40 years.
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Some councillors are concerned that joining the province's two-year pilot project to allow a limited hunt would lead some in the city to open fire on bears that wander into their neighbourhoods. File photo.

Last June, I attended a kayaking symposium. The Friday evening speaker was Mike McIntosh, who operates Bear With Us.

At first, I figured I didn’t need to go to the lecture. After all, I’ve been living in the bush for 40 years. I’ve seen lots of black bears. I’ve read about bears. I thought I knew everything important about bears. But there wasn’t much else to do that evening, so I pulled my up my chair and got comfy.

Within the first five minutes, I was hooked. Turns out I really didn’t know very much about bears. Did you know that female bears are generally six to seven years or older before they breed? Given a very high mortality rate, a lot of bears will never reach breeding age.

The little ones die from starvation, predation, falls from trees, and road-kills. Many of those who survive the first two years are killed by humans before they reach maturity. It is not easy being a bear.

I did know that the female bear has to be very well fed for pregnancy to occur. And that the cubs are born in January. They are very tiny. I had mistakenly thought she slept through the whole process of birth and baby care, waking only when the weather warmed in spring. Not so. She is awake for the birth, and cares for the little ones through the winter months.

She loses a third of her body weight. Having nothing to eat for five months, it is no wonder she has to find so much food in summer and fall.

One of two very surprising facts McIntosh described: a mother bear does not attack to protect her cubs. She will exhibit very aggressive behaviour; huffing, clacking her teeth and bluffing.

From bearwithus.org, “Researchers who routinely capture cubs by chasing them up trees have not been attacked even when they have held the screaming cubs.” Amazing!
Also surprising, when there is a rare bear attack in North America, it is most likely caused by the owner’s dog. An uncontrolled dog will chase the bear and the bear will run — until the dog gets too close.

Then the bear feels a need to protect itself and chases the dog back to the owner, who becomes the victim. Dogs on leashes neither threaten bears nor bring trouble to their owners.

April days are warming, bears have already been seen on our area. I’m very happy to see a few stories in NorthernLife.ca giving good information about how to keep bears out of your neighbourhood.

For a bear, it is all about food. Keep garbage and other foods out of reach, and the bears will go elsewhere.

Mike McIntosh has been working with bears for 23 years. His website, bearwithus.org, has a huge amount of fascinating information about bears, including what to do when they come too close for comfort.

His location in Sprucedale is also a bear sanctuary.

If you are afraid of bears, I hope you’ll take some time to learn more about them. We always fear things we do not know. Learn about bears, how to live in proximity, and with respect.

Being bear wise

Full-blown attacks by black bears are rare.

Black bear attacks are usually not at campgrounds and are usually not by black bears that are familiar with people. 


How likely is a black bear to be a killer? The 500,000 black bears in North America kill fewer than one person per 3 years, on the average, despite hundreds of thousands of encounters.

To put this in perspective, for each death from a black bear across North America, there are approximately 17 deaths from spiders, 25 deaths from snakes, 67 deaths from dogs, 150 deaths from tornadoes, 180 deaths from bees and wasps, 374 deaths from lightning, and 90,000 homicides in the United States alone (data from the National Center for Health Statistics, 1980-1983).
**Source: BearWithUs.org


Viki Mather has been commenting for Northern Life on the natural world and life in Greater Sudbury since the spring of 1984. 


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