BILLINGS, Mont. — Video captured by a Montana wildlife official shows a mother black bear with cubs running toward camera-clicking tourists as the animals try to cross a bridge in Yellowstone National Park.
No one is hurt, but at one point the adult bear rushes full-tilt toward a group of people standing at one end of the bridge. Screams are heard as people scramble to get to their vehicles.
Montana Fish Wildlife and Parks spokesman Bob Gibson witnessed the encounter and said some visitors ignored or were slow to heed a park official’s commands to leave the bridge. As the nervous-seeming cubs scattered, the mother bear raced to round them up, terrifying the tourists.
“The bear was the only one doing anything right there,” Gibson said.
Ideally, the visitors on the bridge would have stayed in their vehicles, said Kerry Gunther, the park’s bear management program leader.
Once the bears started approaching, the tourists worsened the situation by running and screaming, Gunther said. They should have grouped together on one side of the bridge and allowed the bears to pass. Yellowstone has never had a bear-caused injury among groups of three or more people, he said.
Grizzlies generally are feared more because of their larger size and reputation for aggressive behavior.
But researchers have recorded at least 63 people killed by black bears since 1900 in the U.S. and Canada. Of those fatal attacks in which black bears exhibited predatory behavior, 92 percent involved male bears, defying the commonly held belief that females with cubs are the most dangerous bears.
Hundreds of bears of both species live in and near Yellowstone, making for a high potential for dangerous run-ins. Over a three-decade period ending in 2011, black and grizzly bears injured 43 people.
When stacked against total visitation numbers — more than 3.5 million passed through Yellowstone last year — that works out to a 1 in 2.1 million chance of a visitor getting hurt by a bear.
In Yellowstone, adult male black bears can top 300 pounds, while females weigh 135 to 200 pounds. Black bears elsewhere can get much larger because of differences in their diet.
In the park, the animals live up to 30 years, surviving on elk calves, trout, pine nuts, grasses, rodents and insects.
The cubs in the bridge encounter were more than a year old, which likely worked in the tourists’ favor. Their mother would have been more aggressive had she been traveling with newborns, Gibson said.
Wildlife officials often endorse bear spray, which is similar to mace. It shoots out a mist of capsaicin, a form of pepper that makes an animal’s eyes burn and causes trouble breathing.
If a bear is more than 100 yards away, wildlife officials advise people to retreat quietly and without running to avoid attracting its attention.
If the bear is within 100 yards, people are advised to slowly back away and speak to the bear so the animal can recognize that it’s having an encounter with a human and not one of its typical prey species.
Yellowstone entrance fee rising
Beginning June 1, it will cost more to visit Yellowstone National Park. The National Park Service announced Monday that the entrance fee to the first national park will increase to $30 per vehicle. The current fee is $25. The pass is good for seven days. In addition, the pass will no longer cover the entrance fees for both Yellowstone and neighboring Grand Teton National Park in northwest Wyoming.
