Mooresville’s newest tourist – a bear — seems to be making himself at home, at least for a little while.
A small black bear caused quite a stir in some areas of town this week, when he was spotted at several locations near I-77 north of Exit 36. Officials from the N.C. Wildlife Commission suspect the bear is a one- to two-year-old male, possibly the same one that was roaming through Cabarrus County in late June.
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The Mooresville sightings began about 8:30 a.m. Monday when at least two motorists traveling north on I-77 contacted the Tribune about a small black bear they had seen near the rest area north of Exit 36. A Department of Transportation crew reported the same thing, then about 12 hours later a man said he saw a small bear on Big Indian Loop, west of the interstate and about a half-mile south of the first sightings.
Tuesday night, a woman posted on the Tribune’s Facebook page that a small black bear was near McKendree Road, off Brawley School Road near Lake Norman.
Mooresville resident Jason Dunlap called the Tribune at 8:30 a.m. Monday to say he had just spotted a small black bear between the Cornelius Road overpass and the rest area on the northbound side of the interstate.
Dunlap said he noticed the bear while driving to work. “It was just off the interstate, in a grassy area at the edge of the woods,” he said.
He said a pickup truck had pulled over close to the bear, but that the animal then headed into the woods. “That’s something I’ve never seen in Mooresville before,” Dunlap said.
After reading about the bear on the Tribune’s Facebook page, Patrick Brice of Mooresville posted that his wife and daughter also spotted the bear near the entrance ramp of the rest area at 9 a.m. “It was just standing there watching traffic,” Brice posted.
A visit to the area by the Tribune about 8:45 a.m. turned up nothing, and motorists at the rest area said they had not seen the bear. But the N.C. Wildlife Commission said it had received a call about the bear from the N.C. Department of Transportation.
Then, about 8 p.m. Monday, Mooresville’s Darwin Booth said he spotted a bear weighing approximately 150 pounds along Big Indian Loop.
Asked if the commission had any plans to search for the bear, a Wildlife spokesperson said there were none. Just letting it go on its way is the best policy, added Colleen Olfenbuttel, black bear and furbearer biologist for the commission’s Wildlife Management Division.
Olfenbuttel said it is quite possible that the Mooresville bear is the same young male – not a cub, but perhaps about 2 years old – that had to be shooed out of Concord and into some woods by authorities in late June.
Wildlife extension biologist Ann May said in June that her agency believed the Concord bear was a male between 150 and 200 pounds, consistent with a 2-year-old bear. When last seen, it was in Cabarrus County near N.C. 49 and Rocky River Road.
May said mother bears kick juveniles out of their dens when the summer mating season arrives, and the young male was likely looking for a new home, having possibly been born in the heavily wooded Yadkin-Pee Dee Basin near Albemarle.
“It’s on its own now, and it’s trying to figure out where to go,” she said in June of the Cabarrus bear.
Olfenbuttel said that bear could have easily made its way to Mooresville. “They can travel quite a bit,” she said. “It’s nothing for a bear to travel 20 miles in one day.”
Most likely, she added, the Mooresville sightings are of one bear, not a pair.
“Once they leave their mother, it’s rare for siblings to stay together,” she said. “By 2 years old, bears are pretty much solitary. And yours is most likely a male, because young females usually don’t disperse as far.”
Where is Mooresville’s bear headed?
“It could be headed west,” Olfenbuttel said. “We know that bears are established in parts of Catawba County, where there are breeding females. He doesn’t have too far to go if that’s his destination.”
If you spot the bear, leave it be. “Just let him find his way,” Olfenbuttel said. “He doesn’t need our help; he’ll be fine.”
The black bear population in North Carolina has grown from fewer than 5,000 bears in 1980 to between 17,000 and 18,000 now, May said. Their range has expanded west from the coast to I-95 and east from the deep mountains to the foothills.
May stressed that black bears are not dangerous – there has never been an unprovoked attack on a human in North Carolina – but they can become a nuisance if encouraged to stay.
She said residents should make sure they don’t leave food outside their houses, like bags of pet food and dirty grills. She also advised residents to keep their garbage cans in their garages if possible.
If bears don’t associate humans with food, they will move on, she said.