{"id":66064,"date":"2020-03-05T12:19:12","date_gmt":"2020-03-05T19:19:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/first-bear-of-season-is-sighted-north-of-bayfield\/"},"modified":"2020-03-05T19:19:12","modified_gmt":"2020-03-05T19:19:12","slug":"first-bear-of-season-is-sighted-north-of-bayfield","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/first-bear-of-season-is-sighted-north-of-bayfield\/","title":{"rendered":"First bear of season is sighted north of Bayfield"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"A
A black bear shown in this archive photo. Local bear expert Lyle Willmarth says he spotted a large male bear Monday a few miles north of Bayfield.<\/span>Durango Herald file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

An early spring may have arrived in Southwest Colorado, evident by the region\u2019s first bear sighting this week a few miles north of Bayfield.<\/p>\n

Bear expert Lyle Willmarth spotted a large male bear crawling out of a riverbed that appeared to be traveling east into timber, he said in an interview Thursday. It did not appear the bear would go back to the den, he said.<\/p>\n

Willmarth, who studied bears for decades in Colorado, said he\u2019s never seen a bear this early in the season. He\u2019s seen tracks toward the end of March before, but never the animals.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re just having an early spring, there\u2019s no way to get around that,\u201d said Willmarth, who formerly worked as a wildlife technician for Colorado Parks and Wildlife.<\/p>\n

While a bear sighting this early in the season is \u201codd,\u201d Joe Lewandowski, Colorado Parks and Wildlife spokesman for the Western Slope, said it\u2019s \u201cnothing to be alarmed about.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s unusual, but it\u2019s not unheard of for a bear to be out this time of year when the weather warms up,\u201d Lewandowski said. \u201cThey stir and start looking around, but most of the time they go back to their dens.\u201d<\/p>\n

Recent warm weather may have woken some bears in the region, but Lewandowski said Monday\u2019s sighting is not the beginning of bear season as we know it. That usually begins around the end of April or beginning of May, he said. There\u2019s not enough natural food to sustain bears this early in the season, he said.<\/p>\n

A CPW study of black bears in and around Durango<\/a> found recent patterns of drought in Colorado are cause for more bear-human conflict. The animals often forge in urban areas when there is a shortage of natural food, according to the study.<\/p>\n

Southwest Colorado is experiencing moderate to severe drought, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not a great time for a bear to be wandering around,\u201d Lewandowski said. \u201cThere\u2019s not a lot of natural food available.\u201d<\/p>\n

Colorado Parks and Wildlife received 517 reports of bears in 2019 across the region, which includes an area from the top of Wolf Creek Pass, west to the Utah line (including the top of Red Mountain Pass). Of the reports, 189 were related to bears getting into trash and 143 were related to other food sources.<\/p>\n

Bird feeders attracted at least 49 bears, according to reports to CPW. Bears have a habit of getting into unlocked vehicles \u2013 31 bear break-ins were reported in 2019 \u2013 or walking into open garages \u2013 which was reported 16 times last year.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s always safe in Colorado to secure trash, keep garage doors closed and shut low-level windows to avoid bear contact, Lewandowski said. Lock your vehicles at night to stop bears from breaking in and take down your bird feeders, CPW recommends.<\/p>\n

Anyone with concerns about bears or any other wildlife can call the Durango wildlife office at 247-0855.<\/p>\n

bhauff@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

spotting is \u2018unusual, but not unheard of,\u2019 according to Colorado Parks and Wildlife<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":46507,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[1478,1332,3163,28],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-66064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-bear-smart","tag-bears","tag-global-warming","tag-headlines"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66064"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66064\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46507"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66064"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=66064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}