I wonder with New Jersey’s Department of Environmental Protection leader Lisa Jackson moving on up to Washington to serve as head of the EPA under Barack Obama, if New Jersey’s much denied bear problem will magically disappear? Gov. Jon Corzine refuses to accept the truth about bears and places any blame on the ignorance of humans who can’t figure out how to bear proof their homes.
Some unofficial statistics for 2008 are in and it looks like bear conflicts at least doubled from a year ago.
Bear/human interactions are listed three ways.
Category III (Cat III) are situations where the bear is not behaving in a menacing or life-threatening way, and includes basic sightings, but also bears that get into urban areas, are struck and killed by vehicles, are found dead for reasons other than vehicle kills, etc.
Category II (Cat II) are incidents where the bears caused property damage valued less than $500, or got into garbage, entered a campsite but didn’t do any damage, etc.
Category I (Cat I) are the most serious bear/human interactions, include livestock kills, pet kills, vehicle entries, home entries, attacks on humans, unprovoked dog attacks, and others
Bear Activity
2007 2008
cat I 112 276
cat II 726 1489
cat III 570 1059
hit by vehicles 79 144
Tom Remington
