New West Feature
As Grizzly Habitat Shrinks in Greater Yellowstone, Wildlife Managers Forced to Play ‘Musical Bears’
Leading conservationist: "It certainly is an extraordinary waste of manpower and funds to chauffeur bears all over the place."By Brodie Farquhar, 7-21-11
Yellowstone griz. Photo courtesy of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service.
In the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, grizzly bear management faces a major constraint – all the best habitat for grizzly bears is already occupied, even over-occupied.
Or is it?
“I call it the ‘too many fish in a bucket’ scenario,” said Mark Bruscino, the veteran bear manager for the Wyoming Game & Fish Department. Fish, meaning bears, keep jumping out of the best habitat, he said, landing in rural habitats where they can get in trouble with people.
It doesn’t always work to scoop up the fish and put it back in the bucket – not when the fish/bear becomes habituated to human food sources or gets pushed around by bigger, badder bears and keeps jumping out of the bucket, said Bruscino.
When a bear shows up well outside the politically - and socially - acceptable habitat zone of the Greater Yellowstone, the Tetons and surrounding forests – the bucket – Bruscino and his crew swing into action. A culvert trap/cage is wheeled into the area, baited and they settle down to wait for the always hungry bruin to enter the trap. Then the trapped bear is transported into remote back country, away from such temptations as livestock, orchards, chickens, gardens, barns, bird feeders, garbage cans and greasy barbecue grills.
The hope is that the transported bear will stay in the back country and out of trouble. Sometimes that’s what happens. Other times, the bears find their way back to rural areas, and the cycle begins again.
“You have to consider the totality of the situation,” Bruscino said. Is the bear just being a bear? Is it habituated to human food sources? Have game wardens dealt with this bear before? How does the bear behave around people? Age, health and especially sex are considered, he said. Females are critical to growing the grizzly bear population, he said, so more allowances are made for females than for males. Bear managers will work harder, try more alternatives and give females more chances than males.
Eventually, some bears run out of chances and they’re put down as game wardens assess their behavior as getting more risky, more dangerous.
Another analogy comes from Crowheart conservationist Robert Hoskins. He calls grizzly bear management “musical bears” – a pun borrowing from the childhood game of musical chairs. Only in this game, bears cycle through various habitats seeking food, as the habitats shrink in number and/or quality.
It isn’t a fun game, because inevitably, all the bears lose.
Hoskins is frustrated with the entire concept of moving problem bears back to the wild. “They don’t always head for the high country when they’re turned loose,” Hoskins said in an email. “In truth, the policy simply shifts problems around and doesn’t solve anything. It’s all propaganda to act as if they’re doing something. It certainly is an extraordinary waste of manpower and funds to chauffeur bears all over the place. The only true solution is more habitat--don’t try to keep bears out of the Southern Winds, etc.”
Bruscino agrees that more habitat is highly desirable. Any time a sheep-grazing operation moves out of the Greater Yellowstone area, he said, it opens up “new” habitat for bears, because sheep-occupied habitat is never suitable for bears.
Chuck Neal, author of “Grizzlies in the Mist,” takes a broader view as an ecologist. He views the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem as an island – a large one, but an island nevertheless for the 600-some resident bears.
Declaring the grizzly bear recovered under the Endangered Species Act is a political statement, he said, not a scientific assessment.
Earlier this summer, a grizzly showed up south of Meeteetsee, 25 miles outside the grizzly-bear zone defined by the Wyoming Game and Fish Department. Bruscino and his crew trapped the bear and removed it from that environment, but Neal figures the bear was out there for a reason, foraging where bears have historically foraged before.
He’s delighted with the news that a bear (grizzly or black is not confirmed) has been spotted in the southern Wind River Range, up Sink’s Canyon, outside of Lander, Wyoming. Grizzlies are living just a little north in the Wind River Reservation, he said. They could easily expand into the Wyoming Range, down the Sweetwater Valley, down to the Sierra Madres and even do some seasonal foraging into the Jack Morrow Hills, which has a thriving elk herd. Central Idaho and western Montana also have open habitat.
“The problem is political,” Neal said. “There is no lack of suitable habitat and the bears will tell us where habitat is suitable.”
Ideally, and from an ecological perspective, Neal would like to see the grizzly bear expand in numbers and spread far outside the Greater Yellowstone, with linkage to the Canadian bear population, to keep up genetic diversity and vitality. “What we have is a recovering population, not a recovered population,” he said.
The biggest problem is the near-hysteric fear and political propaganda that blocks an expanding bear population, he said. Opponents of grizzly bear expansion have emphasized fear bloody encounters between huge bears and people.
Yet Bruscino and Neal agree that it is possible for humans and bears to co-exist, based on education, respect and tolerance. Both agree that greater risks are found in driving to the store or walking down the street past Fido.
“The vast majority of bears never interact with people,” said Bruscino. Only a small number of bears get into conflicts, he said. Most conflicts are relatively minor, he added, hastening to add that he didn’t want to be insensitive about the California man who was killed earlier this month by a grizzly sow in Yellowstone Park. That mother bear was not put down, because it was viewed as protecting her cubs in the incident.
Where the two men differ is that Bruscino believes the Meeteetsee-area rancher who found a grizzly bear on his back 40 shouldn’t have to modify his behavior or expectations. For Neal, modifying the behavior of people is not that difficult.
“The more crucial question is this,” said Neal. “As a society, we need to decide which has the highest priority – the public’s wildlife or privately-owned livestock operating on public lands.”
The Wapiti Bear Wise program, for the North and South Fork areas of the Shoshone River, demonstrate that people can and do learn how to live in bear country. An offshoot of Bruscino’s bear management efforts, the program educates residents on how to remove bear temptations, use fences and secure garbage cans. Public cooperation is proving to be very high, to the benefit of people and bears alike.
“Wherever you live,” said Bruscino, “you have responsibilities to your neighbors. If you live in town, you keep your sidewalk cleared of snow, so the little old lady up the block can walk to the store,” Similarly, if you live in bear country, then bears are your neighbors and you need to care for your neighbor—which means not attracting the bear onto your property, he added.
“Bears can’t change their behavior,” said Bruscino, “but we can. We make choices.”
Editor’s Note: This story has been corrected. Robert Hoskins’ name in the original post was misspelled.
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I disagree with Bruscino on one point. The Yellowstone Grizzly is not the same bear we had in the early 1970's. Today's bears show a definite change in their behavior from the bears that were harrassed and harangued and nearly hunted to extinction , pre-Endangered Species listing as Threatened . Grizzlies never were listed as Endangered, only Threatened, for entirely political reasons. Had bears been given full endangered species protections, there would have been wholesale mandatory changes in land use policies and backcountry regulations. But having said that , the Great Bear should have been given full endangered specie protection, IMO.
I have seen bears change, and evolve their thinking and behavior towards humans, remarkably so. It took a few generations of sows raising their cubs to avoid humans or learn to treat them nonchalantly unless threatened---which is how 95 percent of human-grizzly encounters go...the human is the violator; the encroacher; the aggressor ; the idiot.
Since 1973, bears have learned more about dealing with humans than hunters, backcountry users, and ranchers have learned about dealing with bears. That is a direct function of human arrogance + ignorance. I've seen bears change, but seen most humans get worse about bears. Honestly.
And by the way , I have more concerns about the less intelligent more brazen , mischievous Black bear than I do about grizzlies. A black bear is more like a 300 lb. raccoon. We had one hanging around the Mormon Church in Cody yesterday , in town.
Your best defense against a grizzly bear isn't a gun or even pepper spray...it's common sense and the courage to do little or nothing overt when you encounter a bear inside of 60 yards. Keep calm. Human overreaction is what cause the problems.
Too much of that overreaction is either political or provincial. In bear country , we humans are not the dominant specie, in spite of what the arboreal rubythroated hominids may believe. Keep that in mind.
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p.s. to correct a typo in the story , it's Hoskins , not Hopkins
People can live with grizz if they know they are there, and take appropriate precautions. My friend who had a ranch in grizz country wanted them there. So the back end of his ranch was up against the USFS and elevation, and thus was never grazed or frequently used. He ended up with bears denning on his land and whenever we ventured into the roadless high country, we saw grizzly bears. We looked for them. We retreated to get away from them and up wind so they knew our presence and could leave. 30 years without a bear conflict. Last year we watched a black bear of size defend his kill, in a jackstrawed fire killed lodgepole thicket. We saw five other bears come by to check out the situation. None were grizz and none were successful at dislodging the diner. We were a half mile away with binoculars and a day to spend doing nothing other than watching the fun, knowing that carrion stink and grizz would soon put the two together. Time and daylight ran out, and we did not get to see any conflict.
One year a USFS timber sale layout crew was camped on this track of a road, and we stopped to tell them that they were on the main grizz trail, and should act accordingly. Pshawed by the experts, we went on our way. Coming back, not even an hour later, both tents were shredded and the lone female USFS person was huddled inside her little 13 foot aluminum trailer. Ma Grizz and two cubs had come through, and did a number on the interlopers equipment. Fortunately, all but one were off working. What was left of camp was moved by nightfall. Over a forty year period, there was no known bear kills of livestock or wolf kills, for that matter. Wolves denned in the high country, and so did great bears. Livestock was never put where it was a temptation. The ranch owner and his wildlife lived in peace, and respect, and anthropomorphic as it sounds, he got along with the local wildlife and they with him.
A big part of the whole problem is the fact that when the wolves were imported into the GYE, no consideration was given to the impact on grizzly or blacks or lions of a rapidly shrinking prey base. I think it shoudl be abundantly clear that the computer model of how things will work is only as good as the info fed in.
Although underutilized, available Habitat is in fact diminishing in griz country...whitebark pine die off, cutthroat loss, cutworm moth loss, but most especially the encroachment of Man and development. Which makes it all the more i mportant to disperse the grizzlies we're are impacting back out to their former range from the Yellowstone enclave . They were there first , after all.
It's only right.
Bruscino , Inc. need to start dropping bears in interior Idaho, the southern Winds, the Uintahs, southern Montana north of the Park and western Montana along the divide. Dare I say central and southern Colorado ?
First of all I doubt that griz can be moved from one area to another without all of the EIS etc that goes along with everything done today.
Any land that is settled is private land not public and by definition is probably NOT good habitat in any sense fo the word.
The Yellowstone Cutthroat are dying because some idiot(s) brought in Lake Trout from elsewhere , probably Lewis lake or Shoshone Lake but maybe further away, and we are paying the price for bucket biology.
The Whitebark situation is not as you describe it either. it is most surely a direct component of the subalpine habitat, a keystone speices being decimated by several impactors simultaneously. The Blister Rust is an alien exotic fungus not native to North America, by the way . It was also imported by man.
Back in the early 70's, the Craighead brothers did one of the earliest satellite remote imaging studies. Using LANDSAT imagery , they compared their own precisely measured " ground truth " areas of prime Grizzly habitat in Glacier and Yellowstone parks, then had the computer analyze LANDSAT images to find other suitable habitat all up and down the Rocky Mountains. It exist in wide abundance.
There is a lot of territory out there that is very suitable for grizzly bear habitat. I do not think you will find much disagreement on that. Where the disagreement comes is ion the interfaces between new development, mountain subdivisions, and especially new roads cut into the back country .
The question then becomes: Does Man have the absolute right to usurp wildlife habitat for his own selfish purposes ? You seem to feel "Yes' , Manifest Destina nd Man the Supreme Being and all that .
I very much say " No" . We have no right to encroach on grizzlies or other wildlife, but where we do we should mitigate and try to do everything we can to preserve liveable domain and range for wildlife alongside our own kind. There are 4.2 people for every Elk in Wyoming, and over 1,000 for every Grizzly bear. Are those numbers reflective of balance and sustainability ?
Men don't have to live in the mountains. Wildlife has no choice. Who are we to say , and why ?
There are an estimated 1000 griz, so are you saying there are a million people in Wyoming?
Is NFS giving new permits to build cabins in the mountains? Are they selling mountain land for development?
Are you ignoring the pine beetle impact on WB pine that could be controlled by logging?
I agree there is land suitable for grizzly habitat, but what else is using that habitat and what would the impact be on those species as well as the griz and humans? Wyoming is a great state, but we cannot carry as many of every species that inhabited America before the white man came.
I have seen a lot of old roads that have now been obliterated in the Big Horns, some by chopping down trees to block them. Can you name me a location where a new road is built across public land?
http://www.ext.colostate.edu/pubs/insect/05597.html
2. The 1000 griz number for Wyoming population is ridiculously high , even if it's John Emmerich of Wyo G&F;saying it. It's a made up nu,mber. he has nothing to back it up, and he should know better. But he is a political creature and it serves his inflated interest to say as much. The true number of griz in GYE is probably closer to 450-525. The number itself is derived from computer models that Chris Servheen et al created, and it is also in their interest to make them appear higher, not lower, than reality.
3.No new FS permits for summer homes. Some have actually been withdrawn. If the Forest Service was selling mountain land, you ferdamnsure would hear about it. They are not, to my knowledge, anywhere within a hundred miles of me. But they do swap tracts now and then. Can you show us any instance of public forest land becoming private homesites , straightaway ? ( Ball back to you )
4.GET REAL,TODD!!!! Whitebark Pine is nearly entirely NOT loggable ! It lives at very high elevation in rugged steep terrain , inaccessible , mostly in wilderness. And logging would be a piss-poor method of controlling beetles anyway . It sure didn;t work back in the 50's and 60's when some of the other 4 species of pine beetle came thru my family's homestead on Bald Ridge-Dead Indian Hill area above Sunlight Basin
5. No dignified answer to your habitat issue because the question itself reveals your ignorance , and reluctance to accept the obvious.
6. New roads over public lands ? Timber sales ( many, including Cody Lumber blazing a dozer road along our fenceline ) ; Infamous Inholdings in Idaho and Colorado forests ; access to former patented lands ( Sunlight Basin mining claims) ; access to wildcat oilwell pads (usually reclaimed afterwards) cannot be denied by FS or BLM ; certain eminent domain actions ( Eagle Nest Ranch Owl Creek Mountains 1990's ; Kirwin mining exploration 1970's ( AMAX Corp)) ; Indian Reservations ( special case) . Those few off the top of my head.
For specificicality, answer your own question , because I consider it impertinent.
When I mentioned new FS roads I really was thinking of something since the 90s and certainly more recent than the 70s. So far all of the wells I have seen have been pretty much in sagebrush country.
The whitebark may not be particularly loggable but the lodgepole and other diseased pine is and infected tracts must be cleared in order to get rid of the infestations.
No Dewey, I don't know of any homesites on FS land and that was my point. In order for habitat to disappear by building homes it woudl have to be public land, privately owned land cannot be considered griz habitat just because you want it used for that. It is privately owned and is habitat for what the owner wants, not what you want.
Unreality 22 is casting unwarranted mendacious aspersions again...
G'day. See you after the weekend. Blather on.
Perhaps the most egregious thing that the human race has ever devised was the notion we have utter supremacy over this planet , alone among the millions of other species. That is specatculalrly wrong on many levels, not the least of which are Judaeo-Christian cre beliefs and that passage from Genesis 1: 20-something that somebody who called himselg a god said we naked apes shall go forth and have donimion over all the lands, fish , fauna, fowl...yada yada.
No matter. We'll be extinct soon enough . Cause of death : Supreme Folly . The planet will heal from the wounds we inflicted and the crimes we committed. May take a few million years, but perhaps the next intelligent species to evolve will actually be intelligent...
We may be technically clever. But we sure aren't very wise.
Save the bears...punish the campers.
Please explain this to me a little more dewey. I'm not sure I have a good grasp of how we stole it all from the bears? Do we need to pay other kinds of monetary settlements to even the score as we are doing with the Indians? Am I OK here in Black Creek Wisconsin......or does the whitetail, elk & wolf have the deed here. Did our great, great, great grand fathers take out mortgage insurance to offset this in some way? Enlighten me please!
Just saying you should read what I write, not what you think I said.
I live in bear country, I was here when they put them on the endangered species list. The politics are the bear has recovered from the great die off when the feds closed the dumps in yellowstone. The political recovery has yet to happen because of this small minority of left wing idealists ,
These are the same people that are promoting the wolf problem,
Sorry Dewey we do not agree with you and we do not agree with your agenda. No we do not believe a word that you write
But the greatest factor is outward pressure from other bears. Increasing numbers of bears in a fixed space . That artificially mapped space ---the GYE Primary Conservation Area---is for all practical purposes shrinking inwards, implosively due to pressure from our species, otherwise known as " encroachment".
BF Skinner's Rats in a Box and Yellowstone's Bears in a Faux Zoo share some similarity.
And those pampered ranchers need to quit providing easy slow meat to griz and wolves , then expecting us to pick up the dinner tab. Let's try to get wolves and bears off welfare, too.
Tumbleweed: the politics of grizzly recovery from 1975 forwards was driven more by the right wing Sagebrush rebellion Wise Use James Wattistas , and the Western Senators who cow-towwed to them, not the left. My own Senator Al Simpson and his partner Malcolm Wallop were very much antagonists. Your sense of history is in error. Read the Grizzly bear chapter in Todd Wilkinson's excellent book, " Science Under Siege" for the reader's digest accounting of it. You do read informative books with big words, don't you ?
Alternate Reality22 is in Wisconsin. He would be the go-to guy for the solid info on beer , cheese, and maybe metalhead machinery topics, not sure. But wildlife three states over is beyond his level of expertise. He's just a molotov cocktail hurler.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with having 2 different User ID's anywhere anytime. As a matter of fact I have a log-in cheat sheet infront of me that has my 63 various log-in names and passwords etc at all the websites I use. It's useful to keeping track of where your junk and spam and such come from by tagging it with a distinct user name. Sequester the source. Everything from banking and Pay Pal , a huge number of news outlets and all that on the high end, and commenting on various bayou and bog web boards at the low end of the internet food chain where you live.
You always use the same alias everywhere you go, and that's in several states. yet you never put your actual name out there for us, so what is the difference between one alias and several ? They're all anonymous. Your 4-bit 56kbps dial-up linear brain must not be able to comprehend stuff much beyond telling darkness from light , recognizing some sounds, telling salt from vinegar by sniffing , or rooting for cyber-truffles under dogma trees . Who besides you keeps the same internet ID everywhere? That's both stupid and not too safe.
But Duh! The reason I had two log-ins here is even simpler. The posts I read and write to are seen on two different Macintosh computers located several miles apart... the one at home and the other in town at the studio. Each Mac has it's own identity and e-mail account, so I can send stuff back and forth to myself via distinct e-mail . Which means I sometimes posted to NewWest from different machines and took the high road by using the log in e-mail address for that machine. The addresses were different but it was the same old me. No deflection or disguise or duplicity intended.
Besides, everyone who needs to know who I am here , already does, or figured it out. They have higher brain functions.
About that mule thing, you have it totally back-asswards but I', not going to bother to tell you ---again---that story . You'll never get it right and you don;t want to. You prefer the distorted inaccurate version because it better suits your purile pursuits here and across five states. I noticed you popped up like a mushroom on a cow chip in an indian newspaper here of late.
Belleve what you want about me smacking a mule alongside the head because his owner was trying to run me over with it on a tight piece of wilderness trail, I do believe you would have done the very same thing ion my position. The alternative was get run over by a mule.
If you can think and act fast enough , that is . Reading your posts, I wonder. I see a slime trail...
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(that was fun to write. too many words, though)
Comments like "brainpower and memory of a banana slug" & "he would be the go-to guy for the solid info on beer" don't send me running to NewWest to shut down the blog.... We'll let tumblewood have his (her?) say on if you are a mule abuser or not.....unless the site is shutdown? - by Cody Coyote.