Mother bear and cub set free in foothills above Kingsbury Grade

Two Sierra Nevada black bears, a mother and her cub, were released in the foothills in Douglas County near Kingsbury Grade Thursday night after being caught by Nevada Division of Wildlife officials earlier that morning.

The release went off without a hitch, says Nevada Division of Wildlife Biologist Carl Lackey. Aversion conditioning was performed with the use of rubber buckshot rounds fired from a shotgun. In addition, a Karelian bear dog chased the bears — first the cub and then the female. Lackey is confident that the female and cub will “think twice” before coming around humans again.

The bears had been inching too close to the local honey pot. Wildlife officials were alerted to problems with the bears getting into bee hives near Foothill Road and set up traps in order to catch and re-condition them. The adult mother bear, believed to be around 14 years old, was caught in the trap while the female cub climbed up a tree above the trap. The bears were tranquilized, processed and then sent back into the wild.

With the end of summer near, the appetite of the Sierra Nevada black bear will grow, said Lackey in a news release. Motivated by signals from nature known as zeitgebers, nature's dinner bell will ring as bears dish up their daily caloric intake from 3,000 calories to 25,000 calories per day.

Hyperphagia, as it is called, is a period where bears eat as much as they possibly can so they can put on as much fat as possible to carry them through winter hibernation, said Lackey. Those 25,000 calories are the human equivalent of eating about 50 cheeseburgers per day over the next three months.

“Nothing much gets in the bear’s way when they are this hungry,” he said.

The moon will be full or nearly full for 10 days beginning this weekend (Aug 17 through 24) just at the time that the bears begin to ratchet up their appetites.

“They will eat up to 20 hours per day during a full moon period as they pile on the fat,” stressed Lackey. “People living in bear country should not be tempting these already hungry bears with easy access to garbage, bird feeders or bowls of pet food.”

Areas most at risk of attracting bears by granting access to garbage and other attractants are the Lake Tahoe Basin (especially Incline Village), west Carson City and the foothill areas of Douglas and Washoe counties.

Nevada has had two dry winters in a row and the natural foods that the bears desire are not in abundance in the wild lands. “Plants that create nuts and berries like manzanita, squirrel tail, snowbush, desert peach and rosehips are highly desired but not always abundant in dry years,” said Lackey. “It will be a busy next three months in bear country.”

Persons needing to report nuisance bear activity can call the NDOW’s Bear Hotline telephone number at (775) 688-BEAR (2327). For information on living with bears persons can go to www.ndow.org and find the ”Bear Logic” page on the web.