Interesting Things Children Should Know About Bears

Idaho's black bears begin moving to their dens in mid-October and may sleep for 4—7 months. In general, male black bears are the last to begin hibernating and the first to emerge in the spring. Females with new cubs are the last to emerge from their winter homes. People who live in Idaho are lucky to share their forests with a few grizzlies and a lot of black bears.

As many as 20, black bears inhabit Idaho, but if you go looking for truly black bears, you might be surprised! In Idaho, you are just as likely to see a black bear that is brown in color as you are to see a black bear that is black in color.

Interesting facts about bears

Black bears that live in the western states are often various shades of brown similar to grizzly bears. Eastern bears are usually black. Black bears also come in white the Kermode bear of coastal British Columbia and blue the glacier bear of west-central British Columbia and southeastern Alaska color phases. In Idaho, black bear habitat spreads over 30, square miles of forest, mostly north of the Snake River Plain.

Less than one fourth of bear habitat is on private lands.

The rest is managed by a variety of state and federal agencies, including the United States Forest Service which oversees three-fourths of the bear habitat in Idaho. Idaho's forests can support 20,—25, bears, but the actual population is probably lower than that. Idaho's black bears are creatures of the forest. Camouflaged by its dark fur, a black bear easily fades into the shadows.

How Big is a Bear?

It can move quietly on its soft, broad foot pads. Being able to navigate the forest quietly and unseen helps a bear avoid other bears as it searches for food. If a young bear accidentally comes across a large adult male, who could consider the youngster a competitor , the younger animal needs to retreat before being seen. If necessary, it can run 30 miles 48 km per hour or paddle across a lake!

Because bears have to eat so much, they need lots of room to search for their food and not much competition with other animals. Scientists theorize that this is why bears usually live alone, unless they have cubs. In Idaho, where food supplies are limited, bear home ranges tend to be large and have loose boundaries. Generally, male ranges are larger than female ranges Sometimes male bears will cover more than 50 square miles and will include the ranges of several females. This arrangement ensures the male will have a number of females for mating.

Female bears occupy home ranges that average 12 square miles and often overlap with other females. Bears have a definite social system for those times when they congregate around rich food sources. As with other large and powerful animals, a social order allows bears of differing age, sex, and strength to feed closely without erupting into violent battles.

Where Do Bears Live?

Roaring or raising hackles is often all it takes for an adult male to establish his dominance. Bears also communicate with vocalizations and with scent. Bears, like all wild animals, must share most of their habitat with humans. People enter bear habitat to hike, ride horses, fish, hunt, ski, and snowmobile. They also cut timber, graze cows and sheep, and operate mines in the same forests where bears live.

Biologists and wildlife managers strive to understand how bears use their habitat and how they react to human presence. For example, by studying how bears use logged forests, biologists and managers can recommend logging practices that have less impact on bears. They have learned that bears continue feeding in fields rich with berries if logging ceases during this time. Bears are more likely to return to a logging area if it is small, irregularly shaped and trees are left along streams, roads, and north slopes.

Wildlife managers also know that bears are better off if logging roads are closed instead of remaining open to provide people with routes to hunting, fishing, camping, and hiking areas. Bears also lose habitat when people build homes along lakes and in forests. As people build, their roads cut off bear travel routes, break up home territories , and destroy natural sources of food.

People also provide new sources of food with shrubs and vegetable gardens, bee hives, pet food, and garbage. It should be no surprise that bears sometimes appear on people's property and will take advantage of that easy food. Unfortunately, people often become upset if the bears actually come onto their property.

When that happens, wildlife managers will trap the bear and try to move it back into the forest. Sometimes the bear remains in its new home, but often it returns, traveling as far as 50 miles. If a bear continues to enter private property to find easy food, wildlife managers may have to kill it.

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Bears are highly intelligent and can learn new behavior in reaction to a single experience. For example, bears can be trained to stay away from an apiarist's bee hives even after they have discovered this easy source of food. The apiarist erects an electric fence around the hives. One brief jolt from the fence and the bear knows the easy food source is gone. Some biologists are experimenting with other types of behavior conditioning to help bears learn to stay away from people's homes and gardens.

Can Idaho's growing human population coexist with bears? Idaho has a healthy black bear population now, but if the population declines , it will be slow to build up again because bears are long-lived, mature late, and produce only one or two cubs every other year. Such a decline won't happen if everyone in Idaho works to ensure that both bears and people can continue to thrive in Idaho.

People can learn how to maintain their houses and yards so there are fewer temptations for bears. People can also learn that the sight of a bear on their property is something to be treasured. Our lives are richer when we share the land with wild creatures, and black bears are one of Idaho's wildest wonders. Facts See the Top 10 Questions There are 8 different kinds of bears — American black bears, polar bears, giant panda bears, Asiatic black bears, sloth bears, spectacled bears, sun bears, and brown bears, also known as grizzly bears.

Where Do Bears Live? How Big is a Bear? Bear Feet Bears walk on their feet as humans do, with their soles flat on the ground. Look for tracks like these: What Do Bears Eat? Winter Sleep Depending on where they live, most American black bears go into dens for at least part of the winter. Some species of bear such as the Sun bear, Andean bear, and the Polar bear do not hibernate.

Bear Range Because bears have to eat so much, they need lots of room to search for their food and not much competition with other animals. Keep home sites free of food and litter. Keep a clean camp.

Bears: Facts (Science Trek: Idaho Public Television)

Warn bears of your presence by making noise when traveling in dense cover. Do not get over- confident by trying to get up close to take pictures of bears — they move faster than you, are stronger than you, and are more dangerous than they appear. The teddy bear was named after President Theodore Roosevelt, who was the subject of a newspaper cartoon. Smokey Bear was an actual baby black bear who was the victim of a forest fire in He was rescued from his injuries, and because he was orphaned by the fire, became the spokesman, or spokes-bear, for fire prevention.

The koala bear is not a bear at all. It is, in fact, a marsupial. It lives in Australia, and although it looks cuddly, it has sharp claws and teeth. While they are not considered dangerous, they are not cuddly. Bears can see very well and in color. A bear sometimes stands upright to see or smell scents carried by the wind, but rarely walks on its hind legs. Black bears can run faster than most humans. Click on a Topic: Science of Lewis and Clark.

They can smell food, cubs, a mate or predators from kilometers away. Their great eyesight allows them to detect when fruits are ripe. They are also fantastic at climbing trees, swimming and are able to run at speeds of up to 60 kilometers 37 miles per hour for short periods of time.

Bears produce a variety of vocalizations such as: Baby bears are called cubs , female bears are called sows , and male bears are called boars.

A group of bears is called a sloth. Bears in northern climates reproduce seasonally , usually after a period of inactivity similar to hibernation, although tropical species breed all year round. Litter size ranges from one to six , depending on the species and the productivity of the surrounding habitat. For bears that live in colder climates, the cubs are born during hibernation. The mother bear nurses her babies and keeps them warm as they grow and mature.

Mother bears tend to be affectionate, protective, devoted, strict, sensitive and attentive toward their cubs, raising them to an age where they can survive on their own. Depending on food abundance, mothers especially grizzlies may keep their yearlings a second even a third year, denning together again and breaking up in the third or fourth year. Bears care deeply about family members. They will risk their lives and even fight to the death in order to save a cub or sibling from danger.

Bears: Facts

Bears grieve deeply for others. Cubs are known to moan and cry when separated from their mothers. This can go on for weeks if their mothers are killed by hunters. The tiger is the only predator known to regularly prey on adult bears , including fully grown adults of brown bears, sloth bears, Asiatic black bears, and sun bears.

The only exceptions are black and brown bears. The most accurate way to tell the age of a bear is to count the rings in a cross section of a tooth root using a microscope. The outer part of the root, called cementum, adds a new layer each year. Bears have two layers of fur. A short layer of fur keeps the bear warm. A second layer of long guard hairs keeps water awey from short fur and skin of the bear. The bear ancestor is an offshoot of the ancient Canidae family of dogs, wolves , foxes , and coyotes.

Bears have never lived in Australia or Antarctica. Although bears do not currently live in Africa, bear fossils have been found there.