When I was Anchorage's wildlife biologist and dealt with wildlife and people on a daily basis, I could never fully appreciate the onset of spring like normal folks. With bears emerging from hibernation and humans stampeding to local trails, I braced myself for the inevitable seasonal spike in bear encounters.
Some trails, I soon realized, were worse than others for bear attacks. I'm not a big fan of signs — they clutter up the environment and people frequently ignore them — but I often wondered if I shouldn't hang permanent signs over these trails with the admonition Dante inscribed in stone at the gate of Hell: "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here."
Even more worrisome was the perennial push by well-meaning individuals and groups to improve these trails to attract more people or to build new trails through the invisible auras of other bear magnets. The year before I retired, I began collecting information on brown bear activity on three local trails, and I continued the study for several years under the supervision of Jessy Coltrane, who succeeded me as the Alaska Department of Fish and Game's Anchorage area biologist.
Coltrane has also moved on. However, we submitted the results of our research to Human-Wildlife Interactions, a peer-reviewed scientific journal. Our article — "Brown bear and human recreational use of trails in Anchorage, Alaska" — was published in the journal's spring 2015 edition.
Bear attacks arent random
Between 1908 and 2014 two people were killed and 22 injured by brown bears in the area encompassed by the Municipality of Anchorage — roughly one mauling every four years. Most of these attacks took place in the 774 square miles that now constitute Chugach State Park. Prior to 1990, bear maulings were uncommon and involved men hiking or camping in remote areas. In the past two decades, though, attacks have become more frequent, closer to settled areas and, increasingly, victims include women, runners and cyclists.
Pinpointing the locations of the three earliest documented attacks is impossible. However, since 1990 slightly more than half the maulings have occurred within 100 yards of a salmon-spawning stream. This is worth noting because salmon-spawning streams constitute a very small portion of the municipality.
There is no reason to believe that Anchorage's bears have become significantly more numerous or aggressive. Most attacks involved brown bears surprised on a trail, surprised at such close range that the bear undoubtedly assumed that it or its cub was threatened by the bold approach of a human. The most likely explanation for the increase in maulings and their proximity to developed areas is the expansion of the city and its suburbs and the tremendous increase in people recreating on trails. Today's backcountry recreational activities reflect an urban component -- trail runners, cyclists and a greater proportion of women and children -- that would have been uncharacteristic of early 20th-century trail users.
Some trails more dangerous
Bear attacks aren't random, and we have more control over where and why they happen than most people realize. Some trails are inherently more dangerous because they're more likely to attract bears. In the Anchorage area, these are trails near salmon-spawning streams, particularly trails that double down on your likelihood of encountering a bear by hugging the sections of streams where bears need to fish. They include the Albert Loop Trail, near the Eagle River Nature Center; Rover's Run, in Far North Bicentennial Park; Lower Eagle River Trail, near the mouth of the South Fork of Eagle River; and Meadow Creek, near the Glenn Highway bridges spanning Eagle River.
In the 1990s three hikers were mauled by brown bears in separate incidents over a four-year period on the Albert Loop Trail. After the last attack, in 1998, Chugach State Park's superintendent ordered the trail closed annually during the period when salmon spawned, from late summer through fall, to prevent further attacks.
A female cyclist and runner were injured by brown bears on Rover's Run in 2008. Two years later a male cyclist was mauled as he crossed Rover's Run on another trail. Although one of the bears was later identified and shot, former Mayor Dan Sullivan's decision not to close the trail seasonally made Rover's Run a heavily favored candidate for future maulings.
No one has been injured yet on Lower Eagle River Trail. Very few people use the trail. However, at least one brown bear has been shot in self-defense, and hikers and runners report other close calls. Nevertheless, some have suggested improving this trail to attract more users.
Meadow Creek is another trail where improvements have been proposed. A few people and a handful of brown bears prowl the unmaintained trails along the creek and under the Glenn Highway, along both banks of Eagle River. However, most of this activity is limited to a short segment of Meadow Creek, little more than 100 yards, and a short distance up and down Eagle River. In 2008 a teenager was mauled walking home along the creek at about 2 a.m. Interviewed after that attack, he reported a previous charge at the same location two days before.
Improving the Meadow Creek trails, expanding the parking lot and building a pedestrian bridge to connect to the trail system on the south side of Eagle River would certainly attract more people, while spawning salmon would continue to attract bears. The proximity of these improvements to neighborhoods north and south of Eagle River would encourage unsupervised visits by children.
Trail cameras record bear and human activity
Bear-human encounters on Albert Loop Trail seem to be under control, with no one injured in 17 years, but the other three trails continue to facilitate the intermingling of bears and unwary users. It's difficult to imagine worse places to attract more people. The results of our trail camera study confirmed some of our fears.
From 2009 to 2012, we placed RECONYX trail cameras on a representative section of Rover's Run, Lower Eagle River Trail and Meadow Creek trail. The digital cameras recorded anything that moved along the trail, day or night. We limited our analysis to the period from July 1 to Nov. 1 because that's when brown bears were found on the trails.
The cameras also recorded characteristics and activities of humans using the trails, which we compared to bear use. People were classified by gender, relative age (children, teens, adults) and recreational activity. Activities included walking, running, biking, horse riding and fishing (people carrying rods).
We were unable to collect complete data sets all four years at every location, in part because some cameras were stolen. Two years of data from Lower Eagle River Trail averaged about one brown bear every day (0.86-1.5 bears/day) and one person every one or two days (0.5-1.03 humans/day).
Four years of data from Meadow Creek averaged one brown bear about every four days (0.18-0.27 bears/day). This figure is a little misleading because the camera only captured bears and people approaching from or leaving toward the west; bear visits were concentrated in July and August when the fish were available, and the most frequent bear visitors were a sow accompanied by her cub. On average, one person used this section of trail about every other day (0.26-0.56 humans/day). Other trail cameras along the creek recorded many more people and additional bears walking up and down both banks and in the shallow creek.
One year of data from Rover's Run averaged about one bear every two weeks. Again, this is a little misleading because another trail camera located on the creek, less than 30 yards away, captured more bears. On average, about 17 people used this section of Rover's Run every day.
Rover's Run is near the center of Far North Bicentennial Park. Based on a study of bear distribution using GPS collars and DNA from hair samples, Sean Farley, a research biologist with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, concluded at least 20 brown bears patrolled the city park, primarily during the salmon-spawning season, and most of the bears were often within 11 yards of the streams.
Astounding 3 bear visits per person
To compare relative numbers, we divided bear visits by human visits to obtain a ratio, or a "bear-to-person index." Depending on the year, the Meadow Creek trail segment had 0.35 to 0.94 brown bear visits per person. Lower Eagle River Trail had 0.83 to an astounding 3.04 bear visits per person. Rover's Run had only 0.004 bear visits per person, or about one bear visit per 250 people. It's obvious that, on these trails at least, more human use is associated with less bear activity.
Salmon are a critical food source for brown bears. Because bears don't want to give up the salmon, they try to work around human schedules. Our cameras found 98 percent of humans were observed on trails between noon and 10 p.m., while 91 percent of the bears were observed between 8 p.m. and 11 a.m., the hours humans were less likely to be on the trail. On the other hand, probably because they need to eat every day, bears showed no clear pattern of avoiding trails on Fridays and weekends when people tended to be more numerous.
The types of recreational activity varied dramatically among the three trails. Rover's Run attracted mostly bikers (69 percent) and runners (14 percent). Including anglers, most of the people using the Lower Eagle River Trail and Meadow Creek trail were walking (70 and 95 percent, respectively).
It's no secret that fast-moving trail users, like bikers and runners, are more likely to surprise a bear at close range, precipitating a charge. Its high proportion of bikers and runners may be another reason why Rover's Run has so many maulings.
The most notable difference in gender and age of users was the relatively high proportion of children and teens, many unaccompanied by adults, on the Meadow Creek trail. Improving the trail and providing a conduit between the campground, neighborhood and high school south of Eagle River and the neighborhoods and commercial attractions north of the river would be a recipe for disaster.
More than one way to measure risk
These figures remind us that there is more than one way to measure risk. Among the three trails, an individual's risk of bear attack is lowest by far on Rover's Run; however, so many more people use Rover's Run that the likelihood of a bear attacking somebody is relatively high.
This shouldn't imply, however, that improving the trails along Meadow Creek and the South Fork of Eagle River is a good idea. The ubiquitous presence of brown bears on these creeks virtually guarantees somebody's going to get a good drubbing if more people begin using the trails.
Most of us accept mundane risks -- like getting on a bicycle -- every day without a second thought. Our perception of risk is often a chimera.
Cars are more dangerous to hikers and bikers than bears. An observer from another planet might even conclude that Earthling motorists are the natural predator of anyone with the temerity to venture onto the asphalt veldt. According to the Anchorage Bicycle Plan, from 1994 through 2006, 1,442 cyclists were mauled by motor vehicles in Anchorage and eight died of their injuries. Over the same 13-year period, 71 pedestrians were killed in motor vehicle collisions, while two people were killed and four injured in bear attacks.
And yet, despite our miniscule risk of a bear attack, why ask for trouble? The municipality and Chugach State Park maintain hundreds of miles of trails where bear attacks are extremely unlikely. We really don't need to promote the recreational potential of high-density bear-feeding areas.
Leaving a few streams to bears
Thankfully, this idea is not exclusively mine. One person who seems to agree wholeheartedly is Blaine Smith, and he has unique credentials. Smith was one of the hikers mauled by a brown bear on the Albert Loop Trail. Now he supervises the crew that builds and maintains trails in Chugach State Park, a job that routinely puts him in bear country. He admits to being "a little more jumpy than before."
Smith is a proponent of sustainable trails. He believes sustainability means that recreational trails should be designed and built to minimize physical impacts, like erosion, as well as adverse impacts on wildlife. He's not in favor of building trails in every corner of the park and he's not opposed to seasonal closures to prevent maulings and to protect bears. "If we really, truly want to be different," he told me, "how much are we willing to pay for it?" Smith observed that the public's willingness to pay can be measured in terms of money and "inconvenience."
"Do we want watchable wildlife in Chugach State Park or not?" Smith asked. "There are times when it's the bears' trail."
Most Anchorage residents agree. A survey conducted in 2010 by Responsive Management, an independent organization hired by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, posed a hypothetical situation to a random sample of Anchorage adults (1,258 completed interviews; response rate of 50 percent): "a new or improved trail is proposed along a salmon stream where authorities believe the risk of brown bear attacks will be increased with increased trail use." Participants were asked which management option they'd prefer.
Three percent wanted "authorities to kill all the brown bears that come into the area." Nineteen percent believed the trail should be built, but "authorities should kill only the brown bears that charge or maul people in the area."
Most of the remainder opted to build the trail but to "close it seasonally when bears are most likely to be there" (32 percent) or selected "do not build the trail" (35 percent). The choice of most Anchorage residents is to avoid provoking bear attacks where possible.
Predictably, some people still believe the simplest solution is to kill the bears. But all four trails are in Chugach State Park or the municipality's largest park, Far North Bicentennial Park, which were established, in part, to protect populations of wildlife, including bears. There is no good reason why we can't leave portions of a few streams to the bears.
Rick Sinnott is a former Alaska Department of Fish and Game wildlife biologist. The views expressed here are the writer's own and are not necessarily endorsed by Alaska Dispatch News.