Wyoming grizzlies are inching ever closer to Utah, but if they ever make it over the state line, they probably wouldn’t be welcome to stay.
Lincoln County Sheriff’s Deputy Caleb Ellis photographed a grizzly next to Highway 233 near Kemmerer in April, which is certainly within a grizzly’s walking distance to the Utah state line.
But if a grizzly made the journey, it wouldn’t be welcome in Utah, which has no desire to have a population of the apex predators.
“If I had to guess, if Utah had a choice (over whether to have grizzlies), I think they would avoid it,” Darren DeBloois, game mammals coordinator with the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources, told Cowboy State Daily.
“It’s one thing that we probably don’t need at this point,” he added.
If and when a grizzly does show up in Utah, most likely either from Wyoming or Idaho, it would probably be trapped and sent back to where it came from, he said.
Grizzlies Venture Far And Wide
Grizzlies have ventured farther out from their core habitats in Wyoming’s Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks, and Glacier National Park in Montana.
The last known report of grizzly in Utah was in 1923, and DeBloois said that as far as he knows, there hasn’t been a verified sighting of one there since.
“People send in photos (of supposed grizzly bears), but they’re almost always black bears in their brown color phase,” he said.
Even so, it’s likely a matter of when, not if, a grizzly shows up in Utah, he said.
“In the next decade or so, if we got a solid sighting in Utah, I wouldn’t be surprised,” DeBloois said. “It would be unusual, but I wouldn’t be shocked.”
Meanwhile, grizzlies have been claiming more territory in other states.
They’ve wandered into some of the low country in Park County. A five-strand electric fence was built around the Gallagher’s Corn Maze & Pumpkin Patch near Clark to keep grizzlies from plundering it.
They’ve also been moving into Idaho’s lowlands. Last year, an Idaho farmer took video of a pair of grizzlies frolicking in his potato field.
Grizzlies are a native plains species and have been recolonizing Montana’s high prairies. A female grizzly with two cubs was recently spotted in Montana’s Missouri Breaks country.
And grizzlies in the Missouri Breaks has prompted speculation over whether they could continue going east all the way into North Dakota.
Grizzlies have been ranging farther, and could one day get into Utah. (Cowboy State Daily Staff) 
Grizzlies have been ranging farther, and could one day get into Utah. (Cowboy State Daily Staff)
Grizzlies No, Wolves Yes
Grizzlies could make it to Utah from just about anywhere along the state lines with Wyoming or Idaho that is sparsely populated and they’d have enough space to slip through unnoticed, DeBloois said.
A grizzly crossing into Utah would join a relatively robust population of black bears, he added. A “low estimation” of the state’s black bear population would be roughly 4,000.
But there’s probably no way grizzlies could reestablish a permanent population in Utah, Debloois said.
While the state does have some “wide open spaces,” the places where grizzlies might try to settle in would be too close to densely populated urban areas, he said.
“Utah isn’t in the grizzly recovery zone” designated by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), he said.
So, as long as grizzlies remain a federally protected species, Utah would cooperate with FWS to send any grizzly that wanders in back to where it came from.
If grizzlies are delisted from federal protection and management turned over to the states, Utah could probably make similar agreements with Wyoming Game and Fish and other state wildlife agencies, he said.
Meanwhile, there have been verified sightings of wolves in Utah over the past few years. Some of them likely came from Wyoming.
Utah expects at least a few wolves to stay, Debloois said.
His agency has drawn up a wolf management plan that allows for no more than two established packs in Utah.
Mark Heinz can be reached at mark@cowboystatedaily.com.
