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Habituation - UPDATE - August 24, 2014

A brown bear ignoring a bear viewerA brown bear ignores a bear viewerDr. Steve Stringham followed up our conversation yesterday with an email summarizing his experience regarding habituation—bears getting used to people.

Lynn,
Good chatting with you yesterday. Glad to hear that you are proceeding to test the extent to which habituation to people at feeding stations is generalized to other locations and situations. That is essential for predicting how such feeding stations affect the likelihood of bears approaching other people in the woods, at homes, etc. In my experience at garbage dumps and Alaskan salmon streams, with both black and brown bears: If habituation is restricted to a "few" specific areas and situations such as small feeding sites, bears which are tolerant of people at these sites (at distances down to a meter or less) have not been tolerant of people away from those sites. In some cases, having people move even 1 m deeper into a feeding site or into the woods than normal is enough to make bears nervous and in some cases make them flee. It has only been at sites like Hallo Bay, where bears and people can see each other from long distances and in many locations, that habituation becomes more generalized spatially.
Steve

Bear Educators at the readyBear Educators at the ready - 08-23-14The Hallo Bay location Steve mentioned is an open area over 2 square miles in size where many brown bears graze, dig up clams, and catch salmon. Bear-viewing groups have been visiting there for over nearly 20 years, and generations of brown bears have learned to accept people close by. Steve and Lynn have both led groups of viewers there for over a decade (Lynn 1996-2006). It is a place Lynn hopes to lead groups again when he has more time. Safely viewing brown/grizzly bears close-up as they play, mate, avoid unwanted suitors, care for cubs, forage, and warily avoid certain bears is fascinating, especially when the person realizes the bears could care less about the humans. Steve sees such things daily for weeks on end each summer and has accumulated a treasure trove of observations to compare with our black bear observations.

We are looking forward to the data we will obtain in the next few weeks with the much appreciated help of Lily Fan volunteers.

Sue Mansfield and Mike Johnson just arrived to help with the Black Bear Field Course that is starting tonight.

Thank you for all you do.

Lynn Rogers, Biologist, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center


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