Black bears have spread back into Ohio over the past century, with the animal’s resurgence primarily happening in Northeast Ohio, especially in Ashtabula, Geauga and Trumbull counties. Once driven out of the state due to overharvesting and European colonization, black bears are certifiably back, coming in from neighboring states of Pennsylvania and West Virginia.
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“1850 is the year that we use for a lot of our species that were extirpated,” says Katie Dennison, Ohio Division of Wildlife biologist. “We don’t have any records of black bears after that, until, I think, the 1930s, when we started to have occasional sightings coming through again.”
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Since 1933, black bears have been spotted in 55 of Ohio’s 88 counties — and local populations continue to grow. Sightings, particularly with photo proof, are helpful for the ODW to monitor populations, Dennison says; information can be shared through the ODW’s online wildlife species sighting system.
Mighty Sighting
Ohio’s bear sightings spiked in 2022. ODW confirmed 161 black bear sightings that year, up from 61 in 2021. Sightings of female bears with cubs are also up, which paint a positive future for reestablished bear populations, especially in Northeast Ohio. “That’s really just been in the past decade that we’ve started to see that,” Dennison says.
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Locally Limited
While black bears are not federally endangered, they’re labeled as endangered at Ohio’s state level — meaning they’re protected from hunters. “They would have to be much more well-established in the state than they are currently, before we would downlist them to ‘threatened,’” Dennison says.
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Urban Explorers
What do you do if a bear wanders into your neighborhood? Remove bird feed, outdoor pet food and garbage. “By taking those attractants away, that’s going to give the bears less incentive to be in places where people are and more incentive to go back to those natural areas where they’re going to find natural food sources,” Dennison says.
Rarely Scary
“Black bear attacks on people are very uncommon,” Dennison says. “They typically don’t want to have anything to do with us.” If you see a bear in the wild, give it a clear escape route and slowly back away. If the bear approaches you, stand your ground, appear large and make loud noises to scare it away. For more guidance, visit bearwise.org.
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