Black bears have long been a part of life in the foothill suburbs of southern California.
From Samson the Hot Tub Bear — the P-22 of Monrovia — to Glen Bearian, who was known to have a taste for frozen meatballs in Glendale, black bears strolling through foothill communities, rummaging through trash, and taking dips in pools have largely been a source of amusement to residents and local TV stations alike.
But something has changed — black bears appear to be showing up more than they used to, particularly in the small city of Sierra Madre, nestled against the San Gabriel Mountains about a 25-minute drive from downtown L.A.
A new trend of black bears being around more regularly, and — more concerning — getting into cars and homes more than ever, has put the community on edge, unsure if “coexisting” with bears is realistic.
As the city grapples with this new normal, residents have become divided about what to do about the bears. Are they really a problem? Or do some people just have a problem with the bears? What, if anything, has really changed with the bear situation here?
Those are the questions I explore in Episode 3 of our Imperfect Paradise series Lions, Coyotes and Bears.
When it comes to predators living among us, bears are arguably the ones we're most conflicted about. They’re super cute (case in point: the viral meme, “if not friend, why friend-shaped?”) But they’re also big and powerful animals that could easily kill us.
So if mountain lions are rarely-seen celebrities, and coyotes are ubiquitous villains, bears are somewhere in the middle.
To me, the escalating situation in Sierra Madre shows us how much our shifting attitudes about wildlife may shape what steps we take — or don’t — to live with them, especially in urban areas.
Read on for more information about bears, and you'll have the chance to listen to Episode 3 of Imperfect Paradise: Lions, Coyotes and Bears below.
California bears by the numbers
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Black bears are the only species of bear currently in California, and, unlike most species in this era of unprecedented climate change and urbanization, they appear to be doing pretty well.
The state estimates there are now more than 60,000 black bears in the state, about five or six times as many as estimated in the 1980s. Though still an estimate, that data is more accurate than years past.
Ninety percent of those black bears are in the northern and eastern parts of California, but experts believe populations in Southern California are growing too. Is it just a growing population that’s driving more bears into town? That’s unclear.
Similar to coyotes, black bears seem to do well in urban areas. They're also omnivores and opportunists, which means they generally eat the food that’s easiest to get. They primarily eat plants and bugs, such as acorns, berries, grass and ants, but they’ll also eat animal carcasses, small mammals and, of course, whatever’s in your trash.
How dangerous are bears?
Black bears seem to be more timid than grizzly bears by nature: They evolved in forests and their main defense mechanism is to run up a tree. So far, every time I’ve run into one outside my house in Sierra Madre, or up on a trail, they’ve been more scared of me.
A lot of our misconceptions about bear behavior are rooted in frontier myths about grizzly bears viciously attacking cattle and cowboys. For example, some theories suggest that as European settlers expanded ranching and destroyed the native grasses that grizzlies grazed on, that led to a spike in grizzly bears eating their livestock for food instead. Then, predictably, a spike in settlers killing grizzlies to protect their livestock.
Grizzly bears — or brown bears — used to be the main bear of the Southern California landscape before settlers hunted them to extinction across the state by the mid-1920s.
Like black bears, brown bears are omnivores and opportunities, but they seem more likely to defend themselves, possibly because they largely evolved in plains where there was nowhere to hide. But research on that is not conclusive.
We're talking here, though, mainly about black bears, which are now the only bear in California. And like any wild animal, black bears present a certain level of risk, but, same as with mountain lions and coyotes, experts say the risk is low. There are on average about four injuries by black bears per year across the entire state of California.
That said, the first deadly black bear attack in California’s recorded history was confirmed recently in a small mountain town in Northern California — nearly 500 miles north of Sierra Madre. Since 1900, across all of North America — home to between 600,000 to 900,000 black bears — researchers estimate just 67 people have been killed by black bears.
As human and black bear populations have grown, the risk for conflict has increased too. It’s a particularly tricky situation in areas as populated as the foothills of Los Angeles County.
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- Wildlife coexistence resources from the California Department of Fish and Wildlife
The surprising history of black bears in Southern California
For thousands of years, Indigenous communities across Southern California — and the state — lived alongside grizzly bears. That’s the type of bear on California’s state flag.
But by the mid-1920s, settlers hunted grizzly bears to extinction in California. One of the last grizzly bears in the state is thought to have been killed near Sunland in 1916.
While grizzly bears were largely seen as ferocious predators, black bears had long been seen by European settlers on the East Coast as pests to be exterminated as they razed the bears’ forest habitats to make way for cities and farms.
By the early 20th century, mainstream cultural attitudes toward bears were starting to shift (Hint: it started with former President Teddy Roosevelt and the rise of the Teddy bear toy). Black bears in particular, came to be seen as lovable partners and friends, rather than pests to be destroyed.
In the 1920s and ‘30s, those shifts in cultural attitudes led to bears becoming a major tourist attraction to the growing national park system. And soon, the Angeles and San Bernardino National Forests wanted in on the action.
So, in 1933, 28 Yosemite black bears were trucked south and released into the forests of Southern California. Almost all of the bears that now live in the Southland’s mountains are descended from these bears.
What’s changed since then? You’ll have to listen to the podcast.
Listen to the Episode 3: Lions, Coyotes, & Bears
