4 Aug
2015

Posted in: Natural Science, RIDEM, Uncategorized, URI
By Hugh    No Comments

“Who’s been sleeping in my bed?” Searching for bears in Rhode Island Woods

A sign announces the presence of a bear station. Coiled barbed wire rests at the base.

Once upon a time there were three bears who lived in a house in the forest. There was a great big father bear, a middle-sized mother bear and a tiny baby bear.

One morning, their breakfast porridge was too hot to eat, so they decided to go for a walk in the forest. While they were out, a little girl called Goldilocks came through the trees and found their house. She knocked on the door and, as there was no answer, she pushed it open and went inside…

Amy Gottfried Mayer and Mary Sullivan, research associates at URI, are not little girls looking for porridge. They are, however, searching for signs that a very large mammal may be making regular visits to the woods of Rhode Island: Ursus americanus, better known as the American black bear.

Mayer and Sullivan are working with RIDEM in the second of a five-year study to determine whether bears are making regular stops in the Ocean State, where they may be, and whether it’s likely that the bears are breeding here. Many Rhode Island residents have heard about bear sightings in the news, but until now there hasn’t been a study to see whether the bears were just passing through or were making RI part of their feeding and breeding patterns. “We’re not sure there’s an actual population living here full time,” Mayer says.

On this day, the two are marching through the woods of the Black Hut Management Area in Burrillville to check one of 41 stations that run the length of the entire western half of the state. She manages a crew of 17 volunteers who visit the sites weekly. Most of the sites are on state parcels, but others are placed on Audubon, Nature Conservancy, and private land. For the most part, they abut the heavily wooded portions of western Connecticut and Massachusetts, where bears already reside. “We’re looking for uninterrupted forest area that’s somewhat accessible for checking.”

Amy Gottfried Mayer checks the barbed wire for hairs. She places a notebook behind each barb to better see the hairs.

American black bears can survive for roughly 20 years in the wild, reaching five to six feet (1.5 to 1.8 m) in length and weighing 265 pounds (120 kg.) for males, and 175 pounds (80 kg.) for the females. Except for mating season, bears are usually solitary, and their territory can range anywhere from one to 100 square miles (1.6 – 160 km).

A ten-minute walk into the woods brings them to the first station of the day. There are four maples, each growing roughly ten feet apart to make a square. Around the trees are two rows of barbed wire, the first about a foot off the ground, and the second about a foot above that. In the center is a pile of branches, and a film canister trailing a piece of ribbon is suspended above that. Both the branches and the ribbon are doused with pungent scent chosen to attract bears. The idea, which has been used in other states doing similar surveys, is that a bear will smell the bait. As they cross the wire to investigate, the barb will snag small samples of their fur. (The barbs are too small to penetrate the dense layer of fur and pierce the skin.) “We need the follicle from the hair for DNA sampling,” says Sullivan, whose job it is to put the samples through testing. “From that we can determine the sex, and possibly use the information to track individual bears. If we find only males in a given area, it’s likely they’re just passing through in search of food. Finding both males and females makes it more likely that they may be mating, and therefore beginning to colonize an area.”

Hairs in barbed wire indicate the presence of a mammal. DNA testing will determine which animal it was.

Mayer and Sullivan examine the wires, holding their yellow notebooks behind the barbs to make any fur easier to see. The search reveals the presence of several pieces of hair on one of the barbs. Mayer takes out a pair of heavy tweezers and runs a lighter along it to sterilize it. After taking a moment to allow the tweezers to cool, she removes the hair and puts it in a small envelope containing silica to keep the sample pristine. It isn’t possible to determine whether the sample is from a bear or some other animal without conducting DNA tests (the results of which were not available at the time of this article). Despite four documented sightings of bears in Rhode Island this summer, the stations have yet to produce any bear samples.

After sterilizing the tweezers, Mayer plucks the hairs from the barb.

“We don’t put food out; we’re trying not to encourage things to come here. We’re also walking a fine line between detecting what’s moving through and drawing things in.”

Sullivan’s recipe for luring bears is a work in progress. She uses fish oil, anise oil, bacon grease from a restaurant, even caramel essence from a hunting and trapping catalogue. “Supposedly doughnuts are best. We’re just testing out a bunch of things this summer.

The hair sample is placed in an envelope containing silica to keep it dry. The sample will be put through DNA testing for identification.

Butter flavoring, grape, and strawberry. We’re just kinda seeing what works. Each state has its own recipes.”

Mayer replenishes the bait scent.

Ultimately, the study will help determine whether there is a consistent bear population in Rhode Island, and whether that population is changing. And, perhaps, whether bears really do like porridge.

Mary Sullivan assists Mayer in painting scent onto a sapling.

“Somebody is sleeping in my bed!”
He squeaked so loudly that Goldilocks woke up with a start. She jumped out of bed, and away she ran, down the stairs and out into the forest. And the three bears never saw her again. – Robert Southey

 
Hugh Markey is a freelance writer, naturalist, and teacher living in Richmond. Follow him on Facebook at http://facebook.com/scienceandnatureforapie .