Arkansas bears producing fewer cubs

Last summer’s drought may have some lingering impact on Arkansas’s black bear reproduction, but there’s no immediate cause for alarm, said Myron Means, large carnivore program coordinator with the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission.

Means works with biologists and technicians from the Game and Fish wildlife management and research divisions during February and March to visit female bears at their dens and evaluate their condition and the condition of their cubs to identify trends that may impact the population.

So far this year, the bears in the Ozarks and Ouachitas have shown reproductive rates at roughly 45% of what they typically record. While this might be cause for concern, Means said the bear population is still very healthy and should be able to withstand one poor year of reproduction.

“We’re seeing sows without cubs and sows with only one cub,” Means said. “The female bears and the cubs produced are in good condition, there are just less cubs this year. That’s normally an indication of poor habitat quality during the first few months of the bear’s reproductive cycle.”

“We try to maintain about 60 female bears with radio collars throughout the state to help us with our monitoring work,” Means said. “Of those, about half will be with yearlings and the other half will have cubs with them in their dens.”

Means said female bears typically take two years to have and raise their young. During the first winter, the sows will have their cubs with them and allow them to nurse. Those cubs will stay with the mother throughout the year and through the next winter “learning to be bears.” Upon emerging from their second denning cycle, the yearlings will be pushed from the mother’s home.

“She’ll actually let her female yearlings stay in a part of her home range, but she’ll push the males out,” Means said. “That does two things: It ensures that her female cubs have a good place that provides adequate food and resources, and it prevents issues that can arise from inbreeding. It’s one of those ways nature works that’s just really interesting.”

Despite popular belief, Means said bears aren’t true hibernators. Many animals like groundhogs can lower their body processes, pulse rates and breathing rates for example, to the point they are catatonic. It can take several hours for a hibernating animal to rouse from this state. This is not the case with a mother bear.

“She’ll lower her heart rate and breathing rate as well as other bodily functions during the winter denning cycle, but not to that catatonic state,” Means said. “If she sees, hears or smells an intruder, she can instantly respond. Just about every bear we approach in our research will be awake when we arrive to sedate her.”