TWIN BUTTE, Alta. — Grizzly bear numbers are growing in Alberta and in the rest of the bears’ range in British Columbia and Montana.
That is good news, but higher numbers also mean a higher probability of grizzly bear contact with humans.
Nate Webb, carnivore specialist with Alberta Fish and Wildlife, said a 2007 survey of bear management area six, which is south of Highway 3, west to the B.C. border, south to the Montana border and east to the edge of grizzly range, showed 61 bears.
But bears do not necessarily stay in one region. Males have been documented as travelling up to 4,000 sq. kilometres in their range, and females up to 800 km.
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Montana surveys in 2007 peg grizzly populations in this region and south as far as Missoula, Mont., at 1,000 bears.
Webb said numbers are increasing by about three percent per year, “which is actually quite fast, as far as grizzly bears go.”
Growth is even higher in areas outside Waterton and Glacier national parks and forest reserves in Canada and the United States. That’s the space occupied by ranchers.
“Where the growth is coming from is around the fringes, and in those areas the growth rate is more like six to seven percent per year, which is almost unbelievably fast for grizzly bears.”
Webb said grizzly bears historically frequented the foothills and western prairies of Alberta but were pushed into the mountains following establishment of ranching operations.
“Now they’re slowly, it appears, reoccupying some of that former habitat.”
Webb said Fish and Wildlife is working to get new data on bear numbers through a project that started with a pilot last year to collect hair samples and create a bear DNA database.
Limited study last year identified 51 bears, so “it seems quite clear that the evidence is there that the population has gone up potentially quite substantially since 2007,” he said.
“We seem to be dealing with more sows and cubs and historically it was mostly males … that were coming from the mountains and coming into conflict.”
Livestock predation from bears is hard to quantify, according to Greg Hale, senior wildlife biologist with Fish and Wildlife. He said livestock losses to grizzlies have remained fairly constant, but they are not high.
The more concrete examples of grizzlies getting too close for comfort involve break-ins at grain bins, silage bags and beehive yards.
