The Alabama Black Bear Alliance (ABBA) has just finished its second year of a five year study of the black bear in southwest Alabama. When we started this study, I hoped to eventually be able to provide good answers to questions such as "How many bear do we have in southwest Alabama?" and "How far do bear travel?" However, now, as then, the answer remains "It's hard to say."

Michael Gay and Will Underwood handled the first years work, concentrating on the Mobile Delta and areas in Baldwin County. They received reports of bear, but had no bear take bait. They determined that while bear were obviously in this large area between Highway 43 and the Perdido River at the Florida line, bear density there was extremely low. They did however, catch and collar two bear in Mobile County and one in Washington County. The Washington County bear was a young, 230 pound male caught on Armstrong Creek near Wagarville. We call this bear "Armstrong" and we will hear more about him later.

Andy Edwards, a wildlife masters student from Pulaski, Tennessee took over the work this year along with technician Sara Bales, a junior in wildlife at Auburn University. In June, we met with personnel from the Division of Wildlife and Freshwater Fisheries who had been contacted by a landowner about a bear in the same area in Mobile County that had produced two bear that were collared last year. The bear was occasionally visiting a Christmas tree plantation and doing some minor damage. Andy pointed out to the landowner that his property bordered a creek that was a major corridor in the heart of bear country and to move the bear would be pointless. The landowner agreed and gave permission to try and catch the bear. This bear had a 6.5 inch wide paw-print and was presumed to be a large male. Andy noticed that the bear had a unique feature to one of its paw-prints that made it easy for him to identify. While we saw this track regularly in two areas about three miles apart, he would only occasionally take a snack and would never take a bait two nights in a row - we never caught him.

One significant detail that we have noticed about our bear is that they prefer to live in thick, brushy, spring-fed creeks. This gives them the privacy they need and probably offers the coolest place we have in the summer. I know if I had to wear a heavy, black fur coat all summer I too would be looking for a cool place.

Andy and Sara began trapping in the Creola-Saraland vicinity between I-65 and highway 45 on the pine ridges that border these creeks. Land owners in the area were helpful, which is essential in a study of this type. By the end of August, they had collared six bear. Most were young, one had a cub up a tree nearby, one was a 210 pound male, and one was an old female.

In a 1993 study in the same area, concern was raised because the nine bear trapped had crooked tails. This implied the possibility that the population might have some inbred genetic defect, possibly a health threat. The only bear Andy and Sara caught with a crooked tail was the old female and she had a tattoo in her cheek that showed that she was one of the bear caught in the 1993 study. What this means, I don't know. Perhaps it means that there was a dominant male here with a crooked tail and now he has gone on to that great brushy creek in the sky.

Each bear captured in the study is fitted with a radio collar that transmits a signal at a set frequency. Each collar beeps on a different frequency. If the collar does not move for 24 hours, the beep slows down (mortality beep) to show that the collar has come off the bear or that the bear is not moving, probably dead. Use of the radio collars allows us to track movement of each bear, identify winter denning sites, and retrieve the collars if dropped. The tracking is done by plane and because of funding constraints is only done periodically. As the plane increases in altitude, the area within which the radio signal can be detected increases. At an altitude of 8,000 feet, an area of 50 miles or so in every direction can be scanned.

Armstrong
On June 18th, Andy flew and found that all was well with the two collared bear from 1998. The small female was close to I-65 where she stayed all year. Armstrong was about eight miles north of Highway 56 - he would not stay there all year. Inclement weather kept Andy from flying for two weeks. The next flight was in early June and the female was virtually in the same place. Armstrong however, was nowhere to be found.

After another flight about a week later, Andy called and said he had good news and bad news. He had picked up a signal from Armstrong but it was the slower mortality beep. When I asked him where it was coming from, he said "About 20 miles south of Hattiesburg, Mississippi. Immediately I had visions of someone shooting Armstrong, seeing the collar and deciding to haul the remains to Mississippi and ditch it. Since state lines were involved, I called U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service authorities and arranged for them to meet Andy and Sara and go investigate. I had not heard from them around mid-afternoon so I asked a friend employed with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to see if he could get them on his radio. They reported back that the collar was moving. They could get close, but then it would get distant all of a sudden.

The mysterious "Armstrong"--a 230 pound male black bear.

Later that night, they called to say that after about six hours of walking and tracking "the bear", they met a biologist with Mississippi Game and Fish. In the course of the conversation that followed, they learned that Mississippi Game and Fish had fitted turkeys with radio collars in Desoto National Forest and that one of the transmitters had the same frequency as Armstrong's transmitter. They exchanged frequencies to keep this from happening again. But where was Armstrong. I was pessimistic.

Bear have been killed in Washington County, but this is changing. Landowners have always been protective of the bear, but now the general public is more educated about the bear as well. The Washington County authorities and Courts are much more protective of the bear than in the past. Still, I was worried. If not dead, where could he be. If Andy could pick up a turkey in Mississippi on the Desoto National Forest, surely he could get a signal from Armstrong if he was ok - maybe the collar malfunctioned.

I talked with Dr. Joe Clark, director of our study and a 30 year veteran bear researcher, and told him I feared the worst for Armstrong. He pointed out that Armstrong was a young male with an interest in two things: food and female bears. Joe said he wouldn't be surprised to see Armstrong show up again.

On his next flight, Andy went north to US 84, east to Clarke County, south to I- 65, and west to Mississippi - no signal from Armstrong. As we collared more bear, we continued to fly and monitor their movement. Occasionally Andy would make this same big loop looking for Armstrong. Not one beep - I knew he was dead.

The last week in September, Andy called after his flight and told me that Armstrong was on Bassett Creek about two miles from the site where he was originally captured. I was flabbergasted. Where had he been? If we had only flown the wide loop once, it is possible that we could have missed him somehow, but we flew it several times. Obviously he had traveled a long way. Next year if he goes again, we will widen our circles until we find him.

1999 Comes to a Close
In October we moved to Washington County where a female with a cub was being seen with regularity. After several weeks, a young male was collared. As acorns began to fall, the bear seemed to show less interest in our bait and Andy decided to draw the 99 effort to a close. This brought the total number of bear collared in 1999 to seven (7). The total number of bear with collars from the 98 and 99 efforts now stands at nine bear. Our tentative goal is to eventually have 20 bear with collars.

Future Plans
We definitely haven't caught all the bear that have been at our bait. However, we have a good sample of the Saraland population and will continue to monitor their movements. The big male collared down there was about one-half mile from the Cedar Creek drainage one week then back south and across Highway 45 the next week. Did he visit the bear along Cedar Creek before moving back south? We wish we knew. Next year we hope to collar more bear from the Armstrong, Bassett, and Tauler Creek areas in Washington County. Cedar Creek in north Mobile County has a good population and we hope to put collars on a number of them.

If you have bear sign or sightings to report, contact the Alabama Wildlife Federation at 1-800-822-9453.

One of the main things that has become obvious after two years is that determining how many bear we have in south Alabama, much less the entire state, is an overwhelming and expensive job. It has been difficult to trap bear when we were in areas of high bear density even when they take bait frequently. In areas where density is low, how do you get them to your bait? They may not come by for weeks. Sara and I were talking about this one day and we decided that the key was to come up with an attractant that is dead-on effective. She immediately set out to find it. One day she would smell like raspberry concentrate, the next day like sardines, then the next like some combination of strange pungent smells. She hasn't found it yet, but then again there's always next summer. As attractive as she is, I feel sure that her social life at Auburn would be negatively impacted if she continued the all year.