This black bear was picked up and given a new home in a National Park after he went for a little walk in LA. The bear had found that people in the greater LA area don’t store their trash like we do in Yosemite and have a tendency to leave food laying out so it had started coming down out of it’s natural habitat to seek out human food. Even though this bear has been transplanted to a more natural area where it can go back to foraging for it’s native foods it’s already been spoiled by our food and garbage and may again seek out human food. This is the situation in Yosemite where it’s very important that everyone properly store food and garbage.
With so many people in Yosemite, Rangers spend a great deal of time trying to keep the bears away from human food. Since human food and garbage is so high in fat and calories, if a bear learns it’s easily accessible it’ll often go for human food over natural foods. It’s almost like a drug to them and they’re easily addicted. Rangers chase bears from campgrounds and parking lots and award citations to those improperly storing food. In the worst cases, if a bear going after human food is deemed to pose a danger to park visitors and isn’t responding to repeated attempts to move it away from human food, it may be put down (killed).
Bears are beautiful, wild animals. Please help keep them wild by properly storing your food and garbage in the park. Thanks.