Castle Creek Outfitters
Minnesota Black Bear and Whitetail Guide Service.
LANSING, Mich. - In southern
Michigan, police officers responding to a mid-May domestic violence call were
startled to find a black bear wandering the streets of a residential
neighborhood dozens of miles from the species' typical roaming grounds.
Five bear sightings have been
confirmed in Iowa this year, the first since 2005. And in Wisconsin, wildlife
officials reported this summer the state may have twice as many black bears as
previously believed.
Black bear populations are either
increasing or moving in some Midwestern states, raising the chances of
confrontations with humans in unexpected places — like Terry Cook's front yard
in rural Jackson County.
Cook, 66, went to bed one night
last week and soon heard a telltale rattling sound outside. When he looked out
the window, he expected to see squirrels or raccoons breaking into his
birdfeeders, an ongoing issue for the Henrietta Township man.
"It took me a while to
comprehend what I was seeing," Cook said of the scene outside his house,
roughly 60 miles west of Detroit. "There was a big bear, chewing on the
feeder and busting up the plastic. I was just in shock, really."
While the bear didn't hurt
anyone, it's those kinds of sightings that have state wildlife officials eager
to update their bear management plan. They'll try to get a better fix on the
bear population, and what to do about it, with a series of community meetings
this month. The state Department of Natural Resources will help gather
information over the next nine months with the goal of having a draft
management plan by winter 2009.
About 90 percent of Michigan's
estimated 15,000 to 19,000 black bears are thought to live in the state's Upper
Peninsula, at least 250 miles north of Cook's home in the southern Lower
Peninsula.
But the state's black bear
population has edged southward over the past decade or so, likely squeezed out
of their homes by suburban sprawl or to avoid territory where a larger bear
already rules. Most often, a bear sighted in a new location — especially in the
spring — turns out to be a young male on the prowl for food or an undisturbed
home.
"It's a normal
behavior," said Adam Bump, the
Rarely has that location been in
Battle Creek — about 40 miles from the Indiana border. So police were shocked
to find a bear standing in the middle of a northside neighborhood street about
2 a.m. one morning this spring. The bear scrambled between houses and climbed
backyard fences while officers shot at him. The bear was hit by a patrol car
and scrambled up a pine tree by an elementary school, where police shot and
killed him.
Other sightings over the past few
years abound.
A young bear was struck and
killed by a car in Ada, less than 10 miles east of Grand Rapids, in 2007. A
135-pound bear was killed in 2006 after being struck by at least three vehicles
on I-75 in urban Flint Township.
In the Lansing area in 2005, a
bear was seen in a Wal-Mart parking lot north of the state's capital city,
another in a residential neighborhood just west of town.
Two black bears have been shot in
Iowa this year, among the state's five confirmed sightings. Wildlife officials
speculate the bears may have wandered in from neighboring Minnesota or
Missouri, although they haven't ruled out the possibility some of the bears may
have been released into the wild by former owners or escaped from their holding
pens.
Wisconsin officials now estimate
their black bear population is about 26,000, twice as many as previously
thought, based on preliminary results of a study coordinated by the University
of Wisconsin.
That's no surprise to residents
of northern Wisconsin's Rusk County, which reported 11 bear-vehicle accidents
this year through July. That's up from eight for all of 2007.
There also are more bear
complaints in and around Ladysmith, the county's biggest city with a population
of about 3,600.
"They're hitting garbage
cans and bird feeders, looking for something to eat," Rusk County Sheriff
David Kaminski said. "People need to be aware they're out there."