Are you Bear …Aware? …Wise? …Smart?

These days, it’s not easy to know if you’re current on bear safety and conservation. To protect yourself, should you be aware, wise, or smart? You’ve likely heard of all of these phrases, often used interchangeably, but what’s different between them? Being bear aware, wise, and smart all have the common goal of sharing information and resources about living, working, and recreating in bear country to reduce conflicts between humans and bears. But each phrase is attached to an established program.

This flyer from the Bear Aware Campaign can often be found at trailheads and other recreation sites.

Of this triad of bear knowledge levels, being Bear Aware is likely the most familiar phrase. This saying is generally used to refer to practicing bear safety, and much of this messaging comes from the Bear Aware Campaign. With so much information available about bear safety, this campaign creates consistent messaging about how to responsibly be in bear habitat, whether it’s with black bears or grizzlies. The messaging created through this campaign is used by the National Park Service; the Forest Service; Montana Fish, Wildlife, and Parks; Counter Assault bear spray; and many other agencies and organizations.

BearWise is all about black bears and education. This program was created in 2012 in the Southeast US, but has become a national effort to provide science-based information on living with black bears.

More recently, Bear Smart has been making its way into the bear coexistence lexicon—a term originating with a British Columbia program to reduce bear conflicts and lethal control. Being Bear Smart is about taking action to prevent grizzly and black bear conflicts within a community whether that’s a city, small town, or neighborhood. From securing garbage to gleaning fruit trees to protecting livestock to providing information on living in bear country, individual residents and local governments work together to keep people, property, and bears safe. In doing so, they become Bear Smart Communities.

In the US, even without an official program, communities have begun adding “Bear Smart” to their names (think Bear Smart Big Sky, Bear Smart Durango, or the newly launched Bear Smart Missoula). Virginia City is another community with the “Bear Smart” label. Over the past few years, we worked with individual residents and the town government to secure garbage, manage attractants like fruit trees, and provide information about bears to community members. Since implementing these projects, Virginia City hasn’t experienced any human-bear conflicts. (Learn more about this project in the video below.)

In 2020, inspired by the Canadian program, and using it as a blueprint, we reached out to the Interagency Grizzly Bear Committee (IGBC) about creating a formal program to guide communities in the Northern Rockies to become Bear Smart. We served on an IGBC working group to develop a program to propose to the IGBC’s executive committee. After two years of hard work and many meetings, In December of this year, we attended the IGBC’s annual executive meeting where they voted on next steps for an official Bear Smart Community Program. We were thrilled when the IGBC agreed to publish a framework for communities to follow to become Bear Smart and hire a coordinator to help communities through the process. (More details coming soon to the IGBC’s website.)

This decision from the IGBC is a big step in making it possible for communities to prevent human-bear conflicts. With a more formal program, communities have steps to follow that can make the process easier. Communities can also connect with and learn from each other about preventing conflicts instead of starting from scratch, whether it’s figuring out how to switch out an entire city’s supply of garbage cans to bear-resistant ones or the best way to encourage people to put away their bird feeders until bears are asleep.

Becoming a Bear Smart Community is a process driven by those living within that community and takes place at a community-wide scale. At People and Carnivores, we’re excited to help communities through this process by sharing our knowledge on conflict prevention and resources—just like we did in Virginia City—as communities take on this work.

To learn more on this topic, visit our Bear Smart Initiatives page. There, you’ll find information on what it means to be a Bear Smart Community and resources about living in or visiting bear country.