BEAR ATTACK!

by Grace Hatton

One morning in Oct. 1999, a bear came into our barn and killed our best purebred registered Nubian doe.  We were awakened by the screams of her daughter and sister who had to watch as the bear dragged the pregnant doe out of the barn.  We got up and threw our clothes on and rushed to the barn with our German Shepherd.  When we were about 20 feet away the dog became aware of the problem and started barking and we heard a crash as the bear hit the fence on the way out.  We turned on the floodlights and closed up the barn doors to protect the other goats inside and started up the garden tractor to haul the dead doe up to the house where the game commission could examine it.  My husband  circled the barn with a flashlight and saw the bear's eyes reflect just beyond the reach of the floodlights.

We had turned on the intercom in the barn so we could hear if the bear returned and left the flood lights on.  The bear returned immediately.  We heard him climb over the livestock panel fence and then saw him rear up trying to get back into the barn.  His head was close to 8' tall in the rearing position. We were finally able to drive him off. The bear weighs around 400lbs, we think.

The PA Game Commission was very supportive and paid claim as we had very good supporting documentation: ear tattoos on the doe, registration certificate, pedigree showing generations of artificial breeding, and most important an American Dairy Goat Association Appraisal Report showing her linear trait evaluation done this summer where she scored excellent in three out of four traits with a final score of 88 where the highest ever in the breed was 93.

We have been breeding Nubian goats for 18 years and Cassieopeia, named for the Nubian princess of mythology, was one of the three finest animals we have ever had the pleasure to own.  Her pedigree represented generations of selecting the finest bucks in the United States to mate with our does.  She had the highest score of any goat between the Susquehanna and the Delaware in Northeast PA.  Her markings were also spectacular.

The PA Game Commission official told me the problem is due to people feeding bears and making them so tame that they have no fear of humans.  We understand there is someone feeding nine bears only about a mile or so from our home. We hope to have legislation introduced to make it unlawful to feed bears. There were four documented attacks by black bears on humans in Northeast PA this summer alone.  There were numerous attacks on persons walking their dogs in Hemlock Farms.   It is an urban legend that neither black bears nor wolves will attack humans.  The bear that killed our goat will be relocated to another spot in Pike County if it can be trapped.  The official told me it would probably return in about a day, but might avoid our farm remembering the unpleasant experience of being in the trap. If it becomes a repeat offender or if the PA Game Commission finds that a bear has attacked humans, they will destroy it.  Several people have asked us why we didn't shoot the bear.  There is a $500 fine for shooting a bear unless it is in the house with you.  It seems only reasonable that there should be a fine for feeding bears.

BEAR KILLS SHEEP!

Shortly after the first bear attack, I went out to feed my sheep and goats as usual.  My husband asked, "How many sheep do you have......"

The bear had returned and killed a pregnant registered Finnsheep ewe.  These animals are more scarce than Shetland Sheep in the US with only 327 registered nationwide at the time compared to twice as many Shetland Sheep that are under the protection of the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy.

Curly, the sheep that was killed was four years old and had already given us 14 lambs.  The Game Commission official we spoke to had told us the sheep would be safe in their 3/4 acre field because they could run from the bear.  She weighed about 185, about the same as the goat, and the bear had no trouble carrying her away and over the four foot high woven wire pasture fence.

There is now a second bear trap here.  The Game Commission official we spoke to told us the bear might not enter the trap if it had been trapped before.  When we asked if there were a three-strikes,- you're-out rule for bears that attack livestock, we were told there was not.

We learned that the same night the bear killed our goat, two bears were attacking pigs elsewhere in the county.  One of those was trapped.

A bunker mentality is taking hold here.  We have put the remaining sheep in the barn and my husband has installed about 15 pounds of heavy locks and closures on the barn.  We have the intercom on in the barn at night.  We set up a perimeter alarm so we would be alerted if the bear tried again.  You have no idea how quickly a childhood fear of the dark can return.

We are getting more and more feedback on the numbers of people feeding bears.  There is someone in the Hawley RD area feeding 25 bears and countless numbers of permanent residents and even more summer people feeding bears.  There are probably as many people feeding bears as there are bears in Pike County.  This ranges from a person handing a bear a sandwich to people trucking in stale bakery goods and dumping them so they can see the animals.

This has to stop before someone is killed.  This article was written in 1999.

In May of 2001 a bear killed another one of our sheep in our pasture.  I was babysitting my grandkids at the time.  I woke to see the bear eating one of the sheep in the pasture.  She had been a terrific ewe.  She had had quintuplets the spring before and twins the previous fall.  The Game Commission quickly gave us a $500 payment for the ewe since we had already established the value of these animals in the previous situation.  The Game Commission has since implemented a longer bear hunting season in this area.

In 2002 a baby was killed by a black bear in the Catskills in New York State, a little over 100 miles from here.  In the spring of 2003, a law was enacted making it illegal to feed bears in PA and in nearby NJ, a bear hunt will be held this fall.

BLACK BEARS HAVE KILLED AND INJURED PEOPLE

Although the PA Game Commission considers the black bear to be "unbelievably unagressive", that it has  an ''unbelievably unagressive nature" and an "amazingly unagressive disposition" and states that "in general you don't need to fear a bear in Pennsylvania" even if the bear and her cubs are denned in the crawl space under your house that you are occupying at the time there is "no real danger" (1),   "from 1960 to 1980. ... at least five hundred people were injured by black bears in the national parks,* but most injuries were minor, requiring less than twenty-four hours of hospitalization."(2) There were 23 deaths due to black bears from 1900 through 1980.  At least 90% of the injuries are attributed by one source to bears "habituated to people and conditioned to eat human foods." (3) From 1964 to 1976, 107 people were injured by black bears in the Great Smoky Mountain National Park of Tennessee.  More than a third of these injuries were related to people feeding or petting bears.(4)  In a two year period in the mid-70's , black bears were responsible for nearly 4,000 raids on camps in Yosemite National Park. Over a three year period, black bears damaged nearly 1500 vehicles, smashing windows to obtain food in cars.  Yosemite later implemented a plan to stop people from feeding bears and keeping bears out of human foods by closing dumps and improving food storage systems.(5)

Most of the deaths attributed to black bears in the time frame from 1900 to 1980 occurred outside of national parks and were predatory in nature. The black bears looked on the humans as prey and killed and consumed parts of them.  Most of the attacks occurred in broad daylight. Roughly half of the victims were under 18 years of age and five were ten years old or younger.  Most of the other victims were adult males.  Three of the young children were outside playing at the time including one in Michigan in 1948. (6) One man was killed in Colorado and his female companion injured in 1971.(7)  In 1978, three of four teenage boys on a fishing trip were killed by the same bear in Algonquin Park, Ontario. 1n 1983, a 12 year old boy camping with a group in Quebec was pulled from his tent by a black bear and killed (8)  This source believes that the failure of natural food source crops such as blueberries or acorns may be the direct cause of black bear predation on humans.(9)

There is additional data on bear attacks of more recent vintage.  One person was killed and several injured in Washington State (?). From 1983 to 1996, 8 persons were killed by black bears in British Columbia compared to three by grizzlies and in the same period, 56 persons were injured by black bears in the same time frame and location compared to 26 by grizzlies. Two other persons were killed in Algonquin State Park, Ontario by the same bear.

In our own community in Pike County, PA (545 sq mi, population: 40,000 humans and 500 bears) which is 75 miles from New York City, bears have broken into 50 homes in one development in the last three years. In one night, Oct 24, 1998, three different bears attacked several animals in two locations in Pike County killing one 185 lb Nubian doe and dragging her from her barn.  The other attack that involved two bears at once left the owner of an 187 lb pig with $300 in bills from her veterinarian.  Later the first farm was revisited by the bear and a rare (only 327 registered in all of the United States in 1997) pregnant Finnsheep estimated to weigh about 150 lbs was killed and partially consumed. The unnerving aspect of these predatory acts is that the bears chose human-sized targets for predation.

There were four documented black bear attacks on humans in the Pike County area in 1998.  On the 1991 PA Game Commission video, Dr. Gary Alt states that the then current black bear population in PA was reasonable at 7,500.  That population has increased by 33% to the current patently unreasonable 10,000.

We hope that legislation will be introduced to make it unlawful to feed bears.  We further hope that the PA Game Commission reduce the number of bears in Pike County where bears are currently being managed to saturation levels in order to provide surplus bears (for which there is neither food nor territory in Pike County) to surrounding States and counties.  The recent hunting season resulted in 157 bears killed in our county (545 sq mi), giving temporary relief from the problem.  However since many bears live in developments where no hunting is allowed, there are still pockets of overpopulation.

* of North America

(1) Pa Game Commission video, 1991, "On the Trail of Pennsylvania's Black Bears"

(2) Bear Attacks, their cause and avoidance, by Steven Herrero, ( a book that Dr. Gary Alt contributed research to on pages 180 through 182) the Lyons Press, 1985, p.5

(3) Ibid. p. 93

(4) Ibid. p. 96

(5) Ibid. p. 97, 98

(6) Ibid. p. 106

(7) Ibid. p. 110

(8) Ibid. pp. 118-119

(9) Ibid. p. 120

BLACK BEARS IN PIKE COUNTY

(reprinted with permission from the January 1999 Pike County Courier)

In the 1998 bear hunting season 157 bears were harvested in three days in Pike County.  The PA Game Commission called the Pike numbers "surprising" after the second day.  Pike had the third highest number of bears killed in the state, followed in fourth place by Monroe County.  The Game Commission said that prior to the hunt there had been a "huge bear population."  In Pike County, the density of black bears was about one bear per square mile, similar to that in parts of British Columbia where black bears have injured 78 people and killed 10 from 1978 to 1996. British Columbia authorities say that since 1996 the attacks are becoming more frequent as the number of humans and bears in the area increased. In that same time frame in British Columbia grizzlies injured 34 people and killed 4. There were about 20 humans killed by black bears in all of North America in the first 78 years of this century.  There have been 15 people killed by black bears in the last 20 years.

Roughly a third of the black bear victims were children.  Three of four teenage boys on a fishing trip in Ontario were killed by the same black bear.  A boy on a camping trip with a group of other people in Quebec was taken from his tent and killed by a black bear.  Fatal black bear attacks on humans are predatory in nature rather than what the bear biologist considers "agressive." The victims are usually partially consumed. The bear is hungry.

At times during the year a black bear needs to consume up to 20,000 calories per day or as much as ten people might eat in a day.  It takes 68 pounds of blueberries to equal 20,000 calories or 22 pounds of acorns or six and a half dozen sweet rolls or 12 pounds of meat.

The Game Commission's target population for bears in Pennsylvania has increased from 7,500 in 1991 which they felt was a reasonable number back then to 10,000 (in the fall of 2002 there were between 15,000 and 18,000 bears in PA) before the recent hunting season. Pike County is being managed for "saturation" numbers of black bears, in other words for more than there is food or territory so that the surplus bears will provide good hunting in the Catskills and areas to the south and west of Pike County.

The Game Commission message that black bears are "unbelievably unagressive" has been interpreted by some to mean that they are harmless.  Hundreds of people in Pike County feed them.  Some people offer the bears food from their hands and some even have put food in their mouths for the bears to take.  One elderly woman allegedly placed a fluorescent orange collar on a bear.

In a recent study of harvested black bears brought in to check stations showed that 80% of them had toxoplasmosis.  This infection is the same one that is found in some cats.  The disease is especially harmful to pregnant women because it can abort or injure the child she carries as well as harm persons whose immune systems are surpressed due to anti-rejections drugs or other medical conditions. Bear feces would be a source of infection to persons at risk.

An article on black bears in Hemlock Farms on the Discovery.com website, describes generations of bears that den under resident's decks or in crawl spaces under homes.  The Game Commission has stated that the human occupants of the home are in no real danger and has allowed the bears to remain there and allowed the situation to be perpetuated by the next generation of bears.  In the same article, the Game Commission states that the black bears in the Eastern Coastal States (is PA a coastal state?) are no threat to children or pets and that all the agressive bears have been shot.  This is a pretty curious attitude since a bear in Hemlock Farms had to be destroyed last summer because it was attacking dogs that were being walked by their owners.  Frightened dogs tend to run back to their owners with the bear right behind them.  Also in 1991 a family lost their poodle to a bear attack in Blooming Grove.  The dog was in its fenced back yard when its back was broken.  One might not consider rabbits, a Vietnamese pot-bellied pig, a sheep or a goat as pets, but they certainly were to the children and adults that owned them and all were killed by black bears the fall of 1998 in Pike County. The very notion that all the agressive bears have been shot over the 300 years that the East Coast has been settled is also bizarre.  It took mankind thousands of years to domesticate the dog and still there are instances of dogs attacking people.  Our forefathers shot all the bears they could for food or to protect their livestock.  The bears that escaped were those that ran fastest or hid best.  George Fluhr's book on Pike County documents the fact that Pike County was far from civilized until the middle of the last century. In 1768 and again in 1826, attempts were made to have a wool industry in Pike County, but the wolves caused the large scale plans of raising sheep here to fail. A Game Commission official pointed out that since many developments in Pike County cannot be hunted, problem or agressive bears take refuge there.

The Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area has prepared a flier to caution people about bears and warn them before something goes wrong.  The flier warns that "black bears easily learn about human food.

Black bears are attracted to human food.  Feeding bears will 'teach' them to approach people and increase probability of injury. Problem bears that annoy or threaten people must be trapped and removed or destroyed." "From 1960 to 1980...", according to the book, Bear Attacks, authored by Steven Herrero, "at least five hundred people were injured by black bears in the national parks,* but most injuries were minor, requiring less than twenty-four hours of hospitalization."  At least 90%  of the injuries are attributed by one source to bears "habituated to people and conditioned to eat human foods."  From 1964 to 1976, 107 people were injured by black bears in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park of Tennessee.  More than a third of these injuries were related to people feeding or petting bears. The National Park Service implemented a plan to stop people from feeding bears and keeping bears out of human foods by closing dumps and improving food storage systems. It is illegal to feed bears in any of the National Parks in the United States including the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area.  In the rest of Pennsylvania, it is illegal to feed elk, but okay to feed bears.

Problem bears are indeed trapped and relocated, but the majority of them go right back to where they came from.  Which is why the Game Commission allows problem bears to be relocated into Pike County - - even from other states.  Pike County bears that become problems are trapped and released up in the northern parts of Pike County.  The Game Commission hopes that the trip in the culvert trap will be enough to make them quit their undesireable behavior.  Unfortunately some bears have learned to foil traps.  The Game Commission video "On the trail of Pennsylvania's Black Bears" shows several bears managing to eat the bait from the culvert trap without being caught. It is believed that bears are as intelligent dogs.

There is no "three strikes - - you're out" law for problem bears in Pennsylvania.  They are just relocated again, if they can be trapped. In the September 1989 issue of Pennsylvania Sportsman Hunting, in the article Bear Facts by Marcus Schneck, the observation is made that "The black bear definitely carries the equipment to do damage, and according to Robert Buss, wildlife conservation officer in Pike County, the day when one of the bears uses these tools to cause serious injury may not be far off.

Buss said feeding by residents of the surging new developments in the Poconos - - many without much real knowledge about bears - - is causing the bruins to become less afraid of people with each passing year." Many years have passed since then.

Finally in 2003 laws were passed against feeding bears, but habits are hard to break.  Bears will still return for years to places where they have been fed.