干旱区生态环境知识资源中心

In the 1980s, black bears (Ursus americanus) began expanding into historic habitats in northwestern Nevada, USA. Over a period of >30 years, black bears recolonized areas where human populations have also increased. Our research represents one of, if not the longest-running and earliest comparative studies of a black bear population at wildland-urban interface and wildland areas in North America. As the population increased, we observed: 1) increasing human-bear conflicts in areas where several generations of people had lived in almost total absence of bears (70-80(+) years); 2) changes in attitudes by the public toward bears and in the social realm regarding garbage management; and 3) changes in the demographics, behavior, and ecology of this bear population, due to an increasing human footprint on the landscape. Herein, we discuss a few of the lessons learned from this long-term study and the value of a collaborative approach between a state agency, a university, and an international conservation organization. Our collaborative approach allowed us to better understand the ecological, demographic, and behavioral changes in a large, recolonizing carnivore that is a functional omnivore, often residing at the wildland-urban interface, and to use these data to impact conservation and management. Throughout the study, our data were used extensively by various media, emphasizing public education about human-bear conflicts. This media platform proved important because of the impact it had on wildlife conservation. For example, partly in response to media coverage of our data-based education efforts, 3 Nevada counties enacted garbage management ordinances, and the Nevada legislature passed a state law prohibiting the feeding of large game mammals. Further, several million dollars in bear-resistant garbage containers are now used in the region by the public and government entities. The end result of these conservation measures has been a recolonization of the Great Basin Desert by bears from the Lake Tahoe Basin and Sierra-Nevada Range into portions of Nevada where bears have been absent for >80 years.