by Cat Urbigkit
If a black bear does attack you, do not play dead. Fight back with every ounce of energy you have—your life depends on it.
Most fatal attacks on humans by black bears involve predatory male bears. If the bear has approached you quietly and intently, it’s going to try to kill you. That behavior is predatory, not protective or surprised.
If you are able to leave the area after encountering a bear, be sure to alert other people you meet about the bear’s presence and report the encounter to law enforcement authorities.
A black bear that has received a food reward from an encounter with a human may seek out humans in the future, anticipating another food reward. Wildlife managers have a creed that “a fed bear is a dead bear” because, generally, once a bear has learned to associate humans with food rewards, the bear will begin seeking out humans for the food benefit. A bear’s nose is approximately one hundred times more sensitive than a human’s, so a bear can smell food as far as five miles away. Food-habituated bears will break into buildings and vehicles in search of food—whether at a backcountry trailhead or residence. A person who gets in the way of a food-seeking bear can be injured or killed, and the bear making the attack will need to be destroyed to protect future human safety.
Hiking and Camping Basics
When hiking or camping, never leave trash or leftovers behind. Bears can discover them and begin to associate those trails with food. Follow Leave No Trace ethics. Pack out what you pack in. Food should be safely stored unless it’s being prepared for eating or being eaten. Store food, pet food, beverages, and toiletries in airtight containers and coolers, and lock these inside your vehicle. Double-bag trash and place it inside your vehicle, as well. Be sure to roll up all the windows and lock the doors after stashing these items in your vehicle.
Keep a clean tent as well. Aromatic items need to be stored outside the tent. In addition to food, this includes all toiletries, beverages, gum, sunscreen, insect repellant, candles, etc. If you cook at camp, change into clean clothes and store the others in your vehicle. Do your cooking, eating, and dishwashing away from your sleeping area.
In the event storing food inside a vehicle or hard-sided structure isn’t an option, food should be suspended in the air out of a bear’s reach, which means at least 10 feet clear of the ground and 4 feet horizontally from any supporting tree or pole (see diagrams).
ABOUT BEAR SPRAY
Bear spray is a nonlethal pepper spray derived from capsicum, the heat-simulating compound found in chili peppers. Bear spray is an extreme irritant to human or mammal skin, eyes, throat, and lungs. Spraying a charging bear with pepper spray interferes with the animal’s ability to breathe and smell, as well as its ability to see clearly, thus stopping the attack and giving you a chance to escape. You don’t have to be an excellent shot to be effective with a can of bear spray—a cloud of spray between you and a charging bear should be enough for your immediate retreat from the area.
Bear spray should not be used to spray tents, equipment, or campsites. This does not deter bears and may, in fact, attract bears because of the smell.
Having your can of bear spray stored in a pack on your back with its zip-tie safety strap attached isn’t going to help you. Rather, the spray needs to be within easy reach, with the zip-tie removed, and you need to know how to operate it. It’s a good idea to practice using your spray and how you would react in a moment of danger. Practice until you can quickly unclip the spray from your belt or holster, flip the safety tab off with your thumb, and fire. Realize that wind will affect the movement of the spray. The more you’ve practiced, the more self-confidence you’ll have should you need to use the spray in a critical moment.
Be aware that cans of bear spray have expiration dates, so be sure to check your can and promptly replace cans with expired dates, or cans that have been affected by freezing temperatures. Outdated, unused, or dented cans of spray are best for practice. Do not go into the field with a used can. A new can of spray with a minimum volume of 7.9 ounces and a spray capacity of at least six seconds is recommended.
Chapter 2
Coyotes
In October 2009, nineteen-year-old folk musician Taylor Mitchell decided to hike in Cape Breton Highlands National Park, in Nova Scotia, Canada—a park known for its spectacular rugged highlands and ocean scenery. Mitchell was on tour and scheduled to perform that evening to promote her new CD, but the Toronto native had set out on the Highline Trail for an afternoon stroll when she was attacked by a pack of three coyotes. Hearing her screams, other hikers came to her rescue, scaring off the one remaining coyote and calling for emergency medical attention. Mitchell later died from injuries sustained in what has been characterized as a predatory attack. Because Mitchell was alone when the attack occurred, no one knows exactly what happened, or what—if anything—may have triggered the attack. One adult male coyote was shot and wounded at the scene of the attack by a Royal Canadian Mounted Police officer. Although the animal ran away after being wounded, it was later killed by wild-life officials. An aggressive female coyote was also killed when it returned to the attack site a few hours later. A second adult male coyote was also believed to have been involved in the attack, based on photographs taken by other people. Shortly before the attack on Mitchell, other hikers in the area had photographed several coyotes up close that showed no fear of humans.
In total, six coyotes were killed in the area near the site of the fatal attack shortly after it occurred and in subsequent weeks. Evidence indicated that three of the six coyotes had been involved in the attack. All three animals were in good physical condition and were healthy, and at least one of the coyotes had fed on its victim. Wild-life officials suspected that these coyotes had become habituated to humans during the tourist season, and this may have involved the animals receiving food rewards from humans.
While Mitchell’s was the first confirmed human fatality due to coyote attack in the park, the area where Mitchell hiked has a history of coyote attacks on humans, although most human injuries were mild and involved scratches and bites. The coyote is a relatively new resident of Nova Scotia, recorded there for the first time in 1976 and becoming common since then. Numerous factors indicated an increased risk to humans from coyotes in Cape Breton Highlands National Park, including the observed loss of fear of humans by coyotes and their increasingly aggressive behavior toward humans. Additionally, coyotes are protected in this national park (as they are in all national parks). The animals had no reason to fear or avoid humans, and this coyote pack eventually turned to a human as prey.
Eastern coyotes, such as those found in Nova Scotia where Mitchell was killed, weigh more than their western counterparts, and it appears that the reason for such a size difference is the integration of wolf genetics into the eastern coyote population. The average weight of coyotes in Nova Scotia is about 34 pounds, and 50-pound eastern coyotes are not uncommon. For comparison, adult male coyotes in the southwestern United States, from California or New Mexico, weigh about 24 pounds. Researchers disagree as to the sources of the wolf genetics, with one group claiming the eastern coyote is more accurately termed a “coywolf,” which originated through hybridization between eastern wolves and coyotes and now maintains its uniformity between the species, while others assert that the northeastern coyote population is part of a larger coyote population that regularly interbreeds with both coyotes and the population of hybrid coyote/wolves that occur in southern Ontario. Regardless, the result is a larger-than-average coyote.
In the wake of Mitchell’s tragic death, the government of Nova Scotia instituted a program to reduce aggressive coyote behavior, including offering a $20-per-pelt incentive for professional trappers to harvest coyotes; training fifteen trappers to target aggressive coyotes; hiring a specialist to work on human/wildlife conflicts; and enhancing education about avoiding coyotes.
“The aggressive coyote situation is a serious issue in many communities, and our decision today is based on all available science and professio
nal experience,” said Nova Scotia’s natural resources minister John MacDonell. “These new measures are designed to change the behavior of aggressive coyotes so they retain fear and avoid humans.” The department also began instituting a new policy requiring immediate action toward animals that behave aggressively toward people.
Although the new program was effective at increasing hunting and trapping pressure on coyotes, attacks on humans persist in the area. In the year after the program began in April 2010, there were 104 reports of aggressive coyotes investigated by wildlife officers, including nineteen situations requiring an immediate agency response, which resulted in the killing of thirty coyotes.
HOW ANIMALS RESPOND TO HUMANS
In a 1998 paper, “Understanding Wildlife Responses to Humans,” Doug Whittaker and Richard Knight (both of Colorado State University) described how wildlife behavior experts classify wildlife responses to humans, noting they fall into three general categories: attraction, habituation, and avoidance.
Attraction occurs when an animal experiences positive reinforcement and moves toward humans or human-supplied stimuli. Examples include animals learning to raid garbage cans for food rewards, or animals that seek out human settlements for shelter or security.
Habituation is defined as a waning response to repeated neutral stimuli, typically resulting in the loss of avoidance or escape responses. The neutral part is important—a bear that is attracted to humans because of expected food rewards is not habituated, but a bear that continues to graze on vegetation alongside the highway in Yellowstone National Park, despite the presence of hundreds of tourists and their vehicles inching ever closer, is habituated.
Whittaker and Knight noted in their paper that “Wildlife are capable of becoming habituated to people, human-made environments, and most any human stimuli.”
Avoidance is the aversion to negative consequences associated with a stimulus (the opposite of attraction).
While some of these behaviors may be learned, others may have genetic or cultural components within animal populations.
Cape Breton Attacks Continue
The attacks on humans continue in Cape Breton. In August 2010, a coyote attacked a sixteen-year-old girl while she was sleeping outside in a sleeping bag as the other members of her family slept in a nearby tent. The teenage girl managed to fight off the animal but received several bites to her head.
In May 2012, a fourteen-year-old boy stepped off his motorcycle on a trail in Cape Breton Regional Municipality and was viciously attacked by a coyote that knocked him to the ground and repeatedly bit him. The coyote reportedly bit the boy’s feet before attacking the area behind his knee. Fortunately, the teenager was wearing protective safety gear designed for dirt biking, including a chest protector and padded pants, so the coyote was unable to penetrate much of his clothing. The boy did receive injuries to his leg and buttock. The teenager aggressively responded to the attack, grabbing the coyote by the throat until he could get back on his feet, at which point he continued kicking the animal (with his hard-toed motorcycle boots) until the coyote retreated.
The puzzler of why coyotes have become so aggressive in Cape Breton prompted Parks Canada officials to put up $100,000 in 2012 for a two-year research project aimed at answering that question, and at developing a protocol for aversion techniques that could be used on coyotes. Preliminary results are due in 2014.
Parks Canada also began a campaign to train coyotes in the area to once again fear humans. Parks Canada’s resource conservation manager Derek Quann stated: “Coyotes live in family groups, and their learning is social learning, which leads to multi-generational behavior. Coyotes are now being raised as pups not to fear people.” Agency officials are therefore working to recondition the predator population to fear humans.
EASTERN COYOTES
Although coyotes evolved as hunters of small prey, recent evolutionary changes see the animals becoming larger and turning to larger prey species, such as deer. Genetic evidence suggests that coyotes began expanding their range as wolf populations were decimated in the 1800s, colonizing the northeastern portion of the United States and eastern Canada. As the coyote population expanded into new areas, the animals encountered remnant wolves, and hybridized with wolves in the Great Lakes region. There is also some evidence of hybridization with dogs, so eastern coyotes today are of a mixed background, but have evolved into a distinct ecological unit—both physically and behaviorally.
Members of the eastern coyote population are larger than their western counterparts, but are smaller than wolves. Examination of the skulls of eastern coyotes show more than size differences from their western relatives; the examination suggests the wolf’s genetic influence, such as “strong bite forces and resistance to the mechanical stresses imposed by large, struggling prey,” according to a paper authored by scientists with the USDA National Wildlife Research Center.
The National Wildlife Research Center reports that eastern coyotes currently have adverse impacts on certain wildlife populations, including white-tailed deer. Coyotes also reportedly threaten the recovery of the endangered red wolf through hybridization, and are also impacting an endangered population of caribou.
Attacks in the United States
Although many coyote attacks have resulted in human injury, Taylor Mitchell’s death is the second death attributed to coyote attack (and the first in Cape Breton park). In 1981, a coyote killed three-year-old Kelly Keen; she was attacked in the front yard of her home in Glendale, California. In the eighty days after the attack, wildlife control specialists removed fifty-five coyotes from within a half mile of the attack site. Three other small children were attacked and bit by coyotes in a community 90 miles away that same month.
Places like national parks pose near-perfect scenarios for conflicts between people and coyotes. Coyote populations may expand in association with human development and the food base provided (either intentionally or unintentionally), and these areas draw large numbers of people. It is inevitable that the two species will interact and, in some cases, come in conflict.
Yellowstone National Park experienced numerous coyote attacks on humans in the 1990s. In January 1990, a Chicago man was cross-country skiing near the Old Faithful Geyser in Yellowstone when he came upon a coyote lying in the trail. Before the man could stop, the coyote lunged at his face, biting him and knocking him to the snowy ground. The man fought back, hitting the coyote with one of his skis, and managed to get away. The man received medical treatment for the numerous bites and scratches to his face, arms, and body. When rangers arrived at the attack site, they were greeted by not just one but two aggressive coyotes, both of which they shot and killed. These coyotes were already known to National Park Service officials as having shown aggression toward people, including inflicting minor injuries, presumably after receiving food rewards from previous human contact.
In one case in the mid-1990s, a German man hiking with another person in Yellowstone stopped to rest in a field and ended up falling asleep. He woke with a sharp pain in his foot—a coyote had bitten him. The coyote circled the two people for a moment before departing. The man received treatment for minor injuries, and a ranger returned to the scene of the attack to observe the animal. The coyote attempted to attack the ranger. The coyote was subsequently captured and killed, and later tested negative for rabies and distemper.
Park service officials developed a program of scaring unwary coyotes from visitor use areas with cracker shell rounds, bear-repellent spray, and other aversive conditioning techniques, but saw little indication that such methods caused long-term changes in coyote behavior. In response, park policy was changed and focused on relocation or removal of problem coyotes.
The coyote has gradually expanded its range in the last century, seeming to thrive in the presence of human populations and human development. Once restricted to the central part of North America, coyotes are now found across the continent, from north to south and from coast to coast. They are found in eve
ry major ecosystem in North America, from wilderness and national parks to agricultural and industrial zones, and in every major city in the country. If you live in the United States, coyotes probably inhabit your neighborhood.
Coyotes are highly adaptable animals, preying on mice, rabbits, and ground squirrels one week, human garbage and dog food the next. They will eat carrion, kill lambs and young deer, and prey on neighborhood pets. In areas where coyotes learn to associate human presence with food, the small predators lose their fear of humans and become bold or aggressive. Coyotes now thrive in close proximity to people and have benefitted from human alterations to the environment.
While human deaths due to coyote attacks are rare, nonfatal attacks on humans by coyotes are not, and have been increasing. California records about a dozen coyote attacks on humans each year. Researchers believe that, in the absence of harassment by humans, coyotes lose their fear of humans.
Colorado Parks and Wildlife has had ample experience in dealing with urban coyotes and recommends: “It is imperative that communities work together to instill the healthy and natural fear of humans back into coyotes—for their health and safety and ours. Coyotes are quick learners and consistent negative experiences can teach them to avoid people.”
Although conflicts occur year-round where coyotes and humans come into contact, most conflicts occur during the coyote breeding season, which is generally February and March, and during pup-rearing season. Coyote pups are born about two months after the breeding season, so the food requirements for the growing young and the nursing female remain high until late in the summer. This tends to be the time when people and their pets spend more time outdoors, so the possibility of coyote encounters, and conflicts, increases during this time as well.