With the early spring warmup, black bears are beginning to emerge from dens to seek food, and that greatly increases the chance for humans and bears to come into contact with each other and create a potentially dangerous situation.
“Bears are not true hibernators,” Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency spokeswoman Mime Barnes said Wednesday in an email. “They do sleep a lot, and mothers that give birth do den and stay in dens longer. This is to allow the young time to grow. Adult bears without young sleep through weather events, but they also wake and forage throughout the winter.”
Mother bears right now are staying in their dens while their young cubs are growing, but other adults could be out looking for food almost any time, she said. A second-year cub, called a sub-adult at this age, will be waking periodically throughout the winter, and they’ll head out on their own soon, Barnes said.
“Bears are omnivores and can dig for insects and roots, eat buds on trees, grasses and many other things,” Barnes said.
So far, Tennessee’s bears haven’t been out enough to get into trouble with humans, she said.