The Story
A sow American black bear lies sprawled in the leaf litter at Highland Lakes, New Jersey, her tan muzzle buried against the head of a cub. A sibling is in the game too, and for the moment the family is one slow knot of black fur.
Out of the blue one cub turns away from his mother and his sibling and walks toward the person filming. He stops short and glances up. There is a hesitation, a very small bear weighing up a very tall human, and then he gently touches a shoe, so close that his head fills the frame. He turns and walks back to his mother, errand complete.
Why he came over, nobody can tell from the footage, but he brings a black bear's best tool to the meeting: a sense of smell exceptionally keen, better than a dog's, held inches from a stranger's shoe.
SaveBlack bears are normally solitary, and the exceptions are breeding pairs in summer, groups drawn to a feeding site, and a mother with her cubs. Litters run one to five, usually two or three, so a pair of cubs is ordinary arithmetic. They stay with her about 18 months, or until she is ready to mate again.
Black bears are wary of people by nature and not normally aggressive, and attacks are rare. Most bears are only interested in protecting food, cubs or their space, and a cub at a person's feet sits squarely on that list. A sow like this one is large, powerful and surprisingly fast-moving, and she does not charge.
August puts this family in the fruit season. The diet moves from grasses and forbs in spring to shrub and tree fruits in summer, then to nuts and acorns in fall, and to prepare for hibernation a bear can take in 12,000 to 20,000 calories a day. A season of serious eating lies ahead of these cubs, and a winter den after it.
