ASHEVILLE, N.C. (828newsNOW) — It feels like everyone who lives in Asheville has a black bear story. The ubiquitous bears are an unofficial Asheville mascot.
However, while Buncombe County black bears are beloved, they can be bothersome, too. Bears have a habit of getting into trash and tromping through yards, disrupting traffic and upending bins in the process. 828newsNOW reached out to local bear experts for their advice for Ashevillians coexisting with the animals.
BearWise is an organization dedicated to helping people and bears live responsibly and comfortably together through education, outreach and a wide array of online resources.
Biologist Ashley Hobbs has worked with the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission since 2019. She is the point person for bear questions in Buncombe County.
“My role with the Wildlife Commission is to the cover all the human-bear interactions for Buncombe County,” Hobbs said. “I also coordinate our BearWise program on a statewide level. I’m a little bit local, little bit state.”
Hobbs said that most of the calls she receives about bears in the Asheville area can be traced back to a single common cause.
“Most of the time it is some sort of bear activity that’s driven through unsecured attractives, which is completely avoidable,” Hobbs said. “Things like bird feeders and garbage, pet food, are all really common.”
Bear activity around your trash may be picking up this summer after a quieter spring, likely a result of bears content with the natural food source of cicadas, the proliferate, protein-rich bugs which covered Asheville in May and June.
“Anecdotally, it seems like bears were really focused on that natural food source versus finding food sources that are human provided,” Hobbs elaborated.
If bears have been attracted to your garbage, Hobbs recommends investing in a secure garbage bin. Some garbage services offer bear-resistant trash carts. If you live inside the city of Asheville, you can reserve a bear-resistant cart here. Only a limited number of the bear bins are produced a year, with a limit of two per household.
In the meantime, Hobbs has a few alternatives to try.
“I always recommend securing your trash by either keeping it in your garage. That’s properly closed and secured,” Hobbs said. “Or, getting some sort of strap system to keep that lid closed. Keep bears out of the trash. They may roll around the trash can, but keeping them from getting rewarded for that behavior for coming up to trash is kind of the name of the game.”
While the exact number of bears in Buncombe County is unknown, Hobbs said that a census conducted in Southern Appalachia estimated around 9,000 bears live in the mountains of North Carolina.
Out of those 9,000 bears, Hobbs’ favorite black bear stories are the ones with happy outcomes.
“Cubs and yearlings will get things like the big cheesy puff container-type deals stuck over their head and they can’t get it off,” Hobbs shared “It’s always a great feeling when you can locate those bears and get the plastic containers off their heads. Those are always my favorites. The ones with the happy endings, for sure.”
Have a question about bears in your neighborhood? Call the North Carolina Wildlife Hotline at (866) 318-2401 or email hwi@ncwildlife.gov.
For more BearWise tips, visit www.bearwise.org.