July is BEAR Logic Month, a time to teach residents how to live in bear country, including information on how bears are managed. BEAR Logic means to think like a bear and try looking at your property from a bear’s perspective. This will help you understand why bears are frequenting your property and how you can avoid these encounters.
The Nevada Department of Wildlife strives with every bear interaction to keep the bear wild and alive. In fact, the agency biologists and game wardens have a number of tools they deploy when handling a conflict bear, purposely designed to be non-lethal.
Our bear-management team uses aversive conditioning methods to modify bear behavior. One of the most important members of the bear team is our Karelian Bear Dogs, Rooster and Dazzle. These dogs serve as partners for bear-management specialists in resolving human-bear conflicts.
Their job during a bear release is to chase the bear, bark in its face and make it run away or climb a tree. This aversive conditioning is essential in preventing bears from returning to problem sites. Visit our information page and watch the video below for details on how these dogs help condition bears and keep them from becoming too bold around humans.
In addition, other non-lethal management tools are deployed. These can include bear traps, non-lethal rubber bullets and bear spray. While these tools may seem distressing to the bear, they actually teach bears to associate humans with unpleasant experiences. This way bears will learn to keep their distance from humans and ultimately keep them alive.
NDOW has handled over 1,100 black bears since 1997. In that same time period 103 bears have been euthanized for management reasons, mainly public safety. Even though that’s fewer bears killed for public safety than are killed by cars on roadways it is still too many. Please use bear resistant cans for your trash and help NDOW, Rooster and Dazzle protect Nevada’s wildlife.
As Nevada’s black bear population continues to grow the NDOW bear-management team will continue to use non-lethal aversive conditioning to help keep our bears wild.