We put out all sorts of food for them: lawns, gardens, shrubbery, birdseed, grill grease, garbage, dumpster waste. Ours can sustain many more of them than their un-peopled landscape. Why? Because our habitat is better than theirs.
People say our conflicts with wild creatures are our fault because we encroached on their habitat. And we have done all sorts of things to help them lose their natural fear. It’s the people’s fault.ĭeer are eating our gardens and spreading ticks that cause Lyme disease coyotes are killing our pets turkeys are chasing our children to school and geese have overrun our soccer fields because they don’t fear us. After three strikes, the bear is shot – euthanized. But the bear has learned people equals food, and does it again. Shupe arrives, darts the bear and moves it 100 miles. The people call 911: “Do something about your bear.” Get the camera.” Thus begins a photo collection of “Our Bear.”īut it’s the beginning of the end for that bear, because the people are teaching it to associate the smell of people with food. Instead of scaring it away, too many people say: “Oh, isn’t he cute. Trouble starts when a bear turns up in a backyard. As their populations grow, they spread out, often from the Ocala National Forest south into the swampy sprawl of Greater Orlando. Parents disown yearlings, forcing them to find new space. I spent time with Shupe while researching the book “Nature Wars.” He explained that perpetually hungry black bears need plenty of food habitat. He’s a state wildlife biologist once responsible for dealing with growing bear-vs.-people conflicts in central Florida. Tom Shupe thinks black bears have a people problem. Authorities caught a 75- to 100-pound yearling, but think the larger predator bear is still on the prowl. Yet modern Americans have squandered it as a tool for managing burgeoning populations of wildlife.Ī woman is in the hospital after she was mauled by a bear while walking in her central Florida neighborhood on Monday.
0 kommentar(er)
