I’ve always enjoyed Mary Roach’s science writing (especially Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void and Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal). I also have family in Colorado, spent many of my formative mountain-biking and blueberry-picking years trying not to encounter bears*, and passed a conservation truck with a (reassuringly sturdy) bear cage in the back just the other day.
All of this means that Roach’s essay caught my attention, and so today’s fun bit of reading is about the perils, and promise, of life with bears. It’s an excerpt from her latest book, Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law.
Black bears are back and in your back yard | New Scientist
With a growing percentage of Fat Alberts, will coexistence eventually become a possibility? Or even a policy? Could we live with bears in the backyard the way we live with raccoons and skunks?
* I grew up around black bears like those in this article. Large and potentially dangerous, sure (the rule was never get between a bear and her cub, because yeah, just no), but they’re not grizzlies or polar bears. They can be a very different kind of story. (One that starts with “nom” and ends with… you may not be around for the end.)
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