Black bears could be on the move in Missouri

Black bears are gradually starting to move to the more northern parts of Missouri.

The Missouri Department of Conservation has been tracking a growing black bear population and the animals’ expanding range in Missouri over the past few years.

Furbear biologist Laura Conlee said they have been studying bear movement since 2010 and hope to complete the study by 2021.

Conlee said about 300 to 350 bears live in Missouri, but that number could be on the rise.

“We’re trying to get a handle on cub production, adult female survival and things like that to really get an idea of how quickly our population is growing,” Conlee said.

Most bears live south of Interstate 44 in the heavily wooded areas, but researchers are beginning to see some bears in the Lake of the Ozarks area and some areas south of St. Louis.

This year, they have received reports of bear sightings in Rolla and last year had sightings in Ballwin, just west of St. Louis.

“It’s not surprising to get reports in some of these areas, it just doesn’t happen all the time,” Conlee said.

Conlee said they see a spike in sightings in May and June because bears are on the move and young males are leaving their mothers’ territories. While sightings are not common in mid-Missouri, they do happen, Conlee said.

“There’s wooded corridors that lead them up to this part of the state so it wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility to have a bear sighting, we just don’t have bears that reside here (in mid-Missouri),” she said.

Conlee warns anyone who encounters a bear in the wild to give them distance and an escape route and back slowly away. Don’t feed bears, she said. Making noise such as talking or clapping while walking on trails in areas known to have bears alerts the animals to your presence in advance, giving them a chance to stay away, she said.

Conlee said bears are typically shy and do not want to interact with humans. “Aggressive encounters with bears are very very rare,” she said.

But never approach a bear, she said.

Rports of bear sightings are important to the conservation department’s study, Conlee said. Sightings can be reported on the Department of Conservation’s website.