Black Bear Habitat

Food

Bears are opportunists and feed on a wide range of vegetation and animal matter. Although bears eat meat, their diet is primarily vegetarian (nearly 75%), including early greening grasses, clover, and the buds and leaves of hardwood trees in the spring and early summer, fruits, berries, and roots in the summer, and late berry crops and a variety of nuts (e.g., beechnuts, acorns, and hazelnuts) in the fall.

This diet is supplemented with insects, including ants and bees (their larvae, adults, and honey), and occasional mammals and birds. Bears are not considered efficient predators, but they are known to prey on young deer and moose in late spring and will consume carrion. Bears are intelligent, and adapt rapidly to new food sources, including agricultural crops and food placed to attract other wildlife, such as bird feeders, and untended garbage. Therefore, conflicts between bears and farmers, beekeepers and orchardists, and rural residents in the State can occur.

During fall, bears are feeding intensively to build fat stores (often referred to as hyperphagia) for surviving a winter of fasting. Fall foods (wild apples, various berries, acorns, beechnuts and stand crops (corn, oats, etc.)) are especially important to pregnant female black bears who need sufficient fat stores for fetal development and milk production. Bears are active in late fall as long as food is plentiful and normally enter dens by early November. In years when fall foods are abundant, bears will feed longer, and enter dens in late November and sometimes as late as December in Maine. If late fall food is scarce, bears usually enter dens in October, but have entered dens as early as late September.

Cover

Bears are tied to forested habitats, particularly mixed forests containing beech, birch, and maple intermixed with spruce and hemlock. They prefer forest types with a heavy understory that provides thermal and escape cover. A particularly favorite haunt for bears is on the edge of wooded swamps for a well-shaded and concealed location for daytime loafing.

Water

Black bears are often found near water and will drink directly from open water sources but will also gain a lot of preformed water from the vegetation and foods they consume (succulent vegetation, insects, and fleshy fruit).

Space

Black bears lead solitary lives, except for breeding pairs, family groups comprised of adult females and their offspring, and occasional aggregations at concentrated food sources (e.g., crop fields, etc.) particularly during years of lean natural food. Females use areas of 6-9 square miles in Maine. Although, female bears remain within or near the range of their mother their entire life, male bears disperse long distances (often up to 100 miles) as subadults (1-4 years of age) prior to settling into adult ranges that may exceed 100 miles squared. Bears often make trips up to 40 miles outside of their ranges to feed on berries or nuts (or occasionally to an orchard or field of oats or corn) in late summer or fall. When feeding on a concentrated food source, bears may use areas as small as several acres; when searching for dispersed food or mates, they can cover several miles in a day.

Reproduction

Black bears typically breed in the summer, with peak breeding activity in June and July. Fetal development is delayed until the fall and females typically give birth to between 1-4 cubs inside their winter den during the month of January. Cubs will typically stay with their mother for the first 16 months of their life before leaving and establishing their own core range and territory.