Wildlife agents in Idaho tracked down and killed a female black bear and her cub Monday after the female attacked a man outside his garage near the town of Victor, which is near the Wyoming state line.
The incident echoes bad encounters with black bears in Wyoming this year when Wyoming Game and Fish agents killed two black bears near Sheridan after conflicts with people.
Attack At Garage Door
The female black bear attacked and hurt a man Monday as he was opening his garage door in a subdivision in the foothills near Victor, Idaho Game and Fish Department spokesman James Brower told Cowboy State Daily.
She had a cub with her, but the cub didn’t participate in the attack, he added.
The man apparently suffered minor injuries, Brower said.
“I can’t give details about his medical condition, but he was able to contact us immediately after the attack” and apparently didn’t require hospitalization, Brower said.
Game wardens and deputies from the Teton County, Idaho, Sheriff’s Office arrived on the scene shortly after the man called for help, Brower said. They quickly tracked the bears down and killed them.
“It’s always a sad situation to have to lethally remove wildlife, and it’s definitely something we want to do, but public safety comes first,” Brower said.
‘Elevated Number Of Conflicts’
Monday’s attack was the latest in a growing pattern of incidents involving bears in and around Victor and the neighboring community of Driggs, Idaho, both of which are near Wyoming’s Teton Park, Brower said.
“We’ve seen an elevated number of conflicts with both black bears and grizzly bears in that area,” he said.
Nobody was hurt when a potato farmer in the Driggs area recently filmed two grizzlies running across his fields.
The bear population has increased in the Driggs-Victor region, but so has the human population.
“Development just keeps encroaching on bear habitat,” Brower said. “People are building farther and farther up into the foothills.”
Idaho Game and Fish tries to remind people not to leave pet food, garbage or other temptations where bears can easily reach them, he added.
The homeowner who was attacked had been following basic precautions, Brower said.
“We don’t know what was driving those bears to that particular location,” he said.
Bear Trouble In Sheridan
There’s been trouble with black bears in the Sheridan area this spring and summer.
In June, game agents killed a young black bear that had entered two houses in Big Horn and was caught eating from front porch bird feeders at a third house.
In May, a 6-year-old female black bear was killed in Sheridan after it came into town on a food raid for the second time in two years.
Other black bears had to be trapped and removed from in and around Sheridan this spring ad summer.
It’s part of a region-wide pattern of bear trouble, Wyoming Game and Fish large carnivore specialist Dan Thompson has told Cowboy State Daily.
“In talking with managers in Idaho and Montana, they also have had a busy season with black bears,” he said. “In a big picture sense, we are still seeing the impacts of increased human use of black bear habitats over the past few years, with many instances of bears obtaining food rewards.”
Attacks In Yellowstone, Arizona, Canada
There has been trouble this year near Yellowstone and other parts of the country, as well as in Canada.
In July, A grizzly attacked and killed Amie Adamson, 47, of Derby, Kansas, on the Buttermilk Trail roughly 8 miles west of West Yellowstone, Montana.
Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks agents later suspended the search for the female grizzly and her cub thought to be involved in that attack, surmising that the attack was entirely defensive and the bears had probably left the area.
In April, a black bear in Canada shrugged off a point-blank blast of bear spray as it snatched a hiker’s dog.
And in June, Arizona resident Steven Jackson, 66, was killed by a black bear that attacked him at his campsite in a wooded area where he was building a house, according to local news reports.
Mark Heinz can be reached at mark@cowboystatedaily.com.
