MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS, WY – Yellowstone National Park officials announced the lethal removal of an adult female black bear on July 11, following a string of alarming incidents at a backcountry campsite in the Blacktail Deer Creek drainage.
The bear first drew attention on June 7, when it crushed an unoccupied tent at the campsite. The situation escalated on July 11, when the bear climbed a food storage pole, tore down properly stored food bags, and consumed the campers' provisions. This type of behavior is rare in Yellowstone, where bears typically avoid human food. However, once a bear becomes food-conditioned, it can display aggressive behaviors towards humans, posing risks to both visitors and wildlife.
The decision to euthanize the bear was made after considering the growing concerns for human safety, the property damage at the campsite, and the bear's ability to defeat the park's food storage systems in order to access human food.
"We go to great lengths to protect bears and prevent them from gaining access to human food in all areas of the park,” said Kerry Gunther, Yellowstone’s bear management biologist. "But occasionally, a bear outsmarts us or overcomes our defenses. When that happens, we sometimes have to make the difficult decision to remove the bear from the population to protect people and property."
Yellowstone’s bear management practices require that each of the park’s 293 backcountry campsites be equipped with either a food storage pole or a bear-resistant storage box. Park guidelines mandate that backcountry campers hang food from the pole or secure it in the storage box at all times, except while cooking or eating. Officials reiterated the importance of adhering to these measures to maintain public safety and prevent bears from developing dangerous habits.
The last bear killed in a management action in Yellowstone occurred in July 2020, when a black bear injured campers and accessed human food at a backcountry site.
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