Black bear population strong in Maine State biologist pleased with project aimed at tagging, following bruins in North Woods

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TOWNSHIP 10, RANGE 8 – If state bear biologist Craig McLaughlin had any doubt about the health of the black bear population after this year’s long winter and late spring, his fears dissipated last Monday while he was trapping and collaring bears in the North Woods.

He caught four bears in his 42 traps. Two proved to be healthy females – the crucial component in the animal’s proliferation – and one of the males turned out to be a virtual monster, weighing in at 318 pounds.

“He’s a nice bear,” McLaughlin said with a grin as the animal lounged on its back beside the tree to which it was attached by a wire cable snare. “I’d say he’s in the order of 10 to 12 years old.”

The American black bear can live 25 years, but few live more than 10, making this giant, which measured 5 feet 5 inches long, a nice sample of what Maine has to offer.

But getting the chance to see the healthy, hefty bears that are here is not what has pleased McLaughlin the most. It’s the sheer number of bears he’s handled in the past weeks that has provided him with some relief after last fall’s hunt turned in a record harvest for the second straight year. As he said more than once on Monday, there are plenty of bears out there.

“I’ve seen more bears in the past two weeks than I’ve seen deer or moose,” he said while driving along a logging road west of Ashland.

Because hunters killed a record 3,483 bears in 1999, and then took nearly 500 more than that last fall, McLaughlin said it’s crucial he get an estimate of the bear population this year. It was estimated to be 23,000 in 1999, a goal set by state wildlife planners.

Maine’s habitat could support 36,000 bears. But such a large number might pose a nuisance and upset the public, according to McLaughlin. So some mortality needs to take place. He estimates a hunt taking about 4,000 bears will do the job, but the hunt had never seen a harvest of more than 3,000 before, and that’s why he has been concerned.

In the first five weeks of McLaughlin’s trapping for the Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife this spring, he handled 54. His goal was to catch and collar females with radio devices.

Using the radio collars, the department is able to gauge survival rates of female bears by monitoring mortality and births. McLaughlin said the survival rate needs to be at least 85 percent or the population will decline. He said the survival rate the past two years has been between 86 percent and 88 percent.

“We are able to kill more bears now because we have more bears,” McLaughlin said. “Next fall, we could kill another 4,000 bears if the female survival rate stays around 85 percent.”

Growth in the bear population is largely influenced by the number of females producing litters. While bears are long-lived, they are slow to reproduce. Females do not give birth until they are 4 to 6 years of age and then produce litters of just one to four cubs every two years.

The more collared females McLaughlin has in the study, the more exact his estimates of survival rates. Through Monday, McLaughlin had 66 female bears “on the air.” Some had been wearing collars for several years.

Black bear survival is dependent upon food supply, particularly beechnuts, which provide protein. Bears will prey on moose and deer fawns when the opportunity arises, but they are not generally a predatory animal, McLaughlin said. They would be more inclined to raid garbage or bird feeders in the spring than to kill.

McLaughlin said people’s decreasing tolerance of such nuisance behavior is more likely to determine how much the bear population is allowed to grow, rather than habitat restraints.

Contrary to what many think, McLaughlin said black bears, the smallest of the three North American bears, will do all they can to avoid conflicts. The attempts to anesthetize a 118-pound bear made by McLaughlin’s daughter, Amanda, who is also his research assistant, showed this.

As Amanda approached the bear with a drug-filled needle attached to a long stick, the animal attempted to escape by scaling the tree as far as the wire noose around its leg would allow. As Amanda moved closer, the bear turned its back to the tree in defense, all the while huffing and chomping.

“That’s ‘jaw popping,”’ McLaughlin said to his daughter. “Basically, it’s an expression of fear. She’s telling [you] that you’re too close. She knows you have the stick.”

Bears will charge, if threatened, but these are most often “false rushes,” in which the bear comes to a sudden stop and slaps the ground, McLaughlin said. The bear that tried to elude Amanda looked more like a timid dog on a leash, curled up in the dirt.

“There is no question bears can and do kill each other,” McLaughlin said while watching his daughter work. “But mostly they work out their disagreements.”

McLaughlin said conflicts between black bears and people are rare. When confronted by a bear, he advises speaking in a low, calm voice and slowly backing away. To turn and run, he said, would provoke an attack.

When Amanda poked the bear in the rump with the needle, a closer look showed why the animal was fearful.

As the red tag on the sleeping bear’s ear indicated, it was No. 1586, a 4-year-old already in the study or, as McLaughlin said, a “known-age bear.” The animal remembered being poked with the “jab stick” before.

Every other year, bears are trapped and studied in one of three different study areas, around Spectacle Pond west of Ashland, in Stacyville, and in Bradford, to gather data and get population estimates. Updated information is critical, as the population goal set by the public has changed since the bear study started in 1975.

The first goal was to maintain a population of about 8,000. In 1982, the hunt was scaled back, and the number of bears rose dramatically. In 1985, the number was updated and the goal was to harvest 1,500-2,500 bears to maintain a population of 21,000.

When the population dropped to 18,000 in 1990, the bait hunting period was reduced from nine to four weeks, and hunting with hounds was restricted from nine to six or seven weeks.

By 1996, DIF&W estimated the population was up to 21,000, and in the spring of 1999 that number was upgraded to 23,000.

McLaughlin foresees expanding the study to include a new method of tracking bears using bait soaked with antibiotics that stain their teeth, a less expensive method used in at least three states. When bears with the stained teeth are killed in the hunt, DIF&W biologists can tell where they came from.

The purpose would be to get a handle on how the bear population is distributed around the state. Presently, there is no system for managing bear in specific regions as with deer and moose.

“We’re coming close to the cultural carrying capacity,” McLaughlin said. “In parts of southern and eastern Maine, biologists have taken a fair number of complaints. It’s people’s tolerance. We need to maintain the population at a level where there is tolerance.”

At the same time, the DIF&W radio collar study remains at the forefront of black bear research. The second oldest study of black bears in North America, the project, which McLaughlin helped design, has taught him more about Maine’s “black ghosts” than biologists know about the bears anywhere in the world.

“We can tell how many are dying and how they are dying,” said DIF&W assistant bear biologist Jennifer Vashon. “Without the collar, the only time we learn the cause of deaths in bears is through the harvest or road kills.”

Deirdre Fleming covers outdoor sports and recreation for the NEWS. She can be reached at 990-8250 or at dfleming@bangordailynews.net.