Wildlife officer tracks bears in the suburbs

Bruce Richards doesn't get it.

Why don't people lock up their trash? The state fish-and-wildlife officer knows that bears and other wildlife are driven by ravenous hunger. Yet here he stands, up in the Issaquah Highlands, peering into a Dumpster full of goodies: a virtual bear smorgasbord.

He closes the lid and sighs. After 32 years hiking the backcountry of King County, catching poachers and keeping order in the wild, Richards is spending his time a bit differently these days.

Week after week, he finds himself deep in Eastside suburbia, where nature collides with encroaching development and new homeowners wake up to discover bears and other wild animals wandering in their neighborhoods.

Complaints in the county about black bears have more than tripled this year, according to the state Department of Fish and Wildlife — including a bear spotted in Bellevue recently. In Issaquah alone, police have been receiving three to five calls a day since June.

What do you do when swaths of forests disappear into new subdivisions? When creatures elbowed out of their habitats clash with city dwellers?

If you're Bruce Richards, you hop in your truck and answer the call.

Do's and don'ts

If you live near bear habitat:

• Don't leave out food that bears can get into.

• Keep pet food and livestock feed indoors.

• Store garbage in special bear-proof cans or with tight-fitting lids. Keep cans in your garage or a shed until pickup day.

• Wash barbecue grills immediately after use. Keep any fish parts and meat waste in your freezer until they can be disposed of properly.

• Enclose any beehives and fruit trees behind a chain-link or electric fence.

• Empty bird feeders, which will attract bears.

If you encounter a bear:

• Stay calm and avoid direct eye contact, which could elicit a charge.

• Bears are nearsighted. If one has not caught your scent, it could mistake you for prey.

• Identify yourself as a human by standing up, waving your hands above your head and talking. The bear will probably leave you alone.

• Do not approach the bear, especially if cubs are around. Give the bear plenty of room and slowly back away. Leave the bear an escape route at all times. If you are too close, a black bear may "bluff" charge, although it is highly unlikely the bear would touch you.

• Because black bears can reach speeds of 30 mph or more, running may stimulate the bear's instinct to chase. If you cannot safely move away from the bear and the bear doesn't flee, then try to scare it away by aggressively clapping your hands or yelling.

• In the unlikely event a black bear attacks you, fight back aggressively using your bare hands or any object you can reach. As a last resort, should the attack continue, protect yourself by curling into a ball or lying flat on the ground on your stomach and playing dead. Do not look up or move until you are certain the bear is gone.

When a bear is caught:

The state Department of Fish and Wildlife monitors the behavior patterns of a bear. If one has become a "nuisance bear" — meaning it has become aggressive and grown to depend on human scraps for food — the department will euthanize it. Those caught in traps and not considered a public-safety hazard are sedated and released in remote areas. Sometimes, officers will do what's called a "hard release" to make the bear relearn its fear of humans. Officers set off noisy firecrackers and scream and yell so that the animal associates the scary experience with people and will avoid them.

Source: state Department of Fish and Wildlife

Root of the issue: food

As one of the few veteran wildlife specialists in the department, Richards responds to the majority of complaints in King County. Sightings and incidents have jumped to 124 already this year, compared with 34 in all of 2004.

Those who track the bear population say vanishing woodlands play a big role in the growing number of encounters.

Generally, black bears are scared of humans. Injuries are rare — there's only been one recorded death and just three attacks in the state's history.

But problems start when bears begin to associate people with food. The creatures can get aggressive, and they have extraordinary strength. They will destroy garbage bins, overturn barbecue grills and topple bird feeders to fill their stomachs.

The path of destruction leaves telltale signs. Richards and other officers look for clues such as paw prints, droppings, hair and teeth marks to determine whether the culprit was a bear, a cougar or another animal.

Part of Richards' job is to lure these suburban bears into a wheeled, culvertlike trap. Made of steel, the traps are baited with doughnuts and can hold a 350-pound bear. Richards has caught two bears in the Issaquah Highlands this summer.

Richards affixes a numbered tag to the captured animal's ear and moves it to a new home, sometimes more than 50 miles away. It's one of his least-favorite duties.

"It bothers me, having to move a bear, knowing that's where he grew up. It's like me taking you to Spokane and saying, 'See ya later.' "

Many times, the bears come back. "Their brains are like magnetic compasses. They have an innate ability to find their way home."

A touch of admiration slips into his voice.

A love of animals

Richards never really thought of another line of work. He grew up in Steamboat Springs, Colo., hunting and fishing with his brothers. He remembered every animal he saw out in the woods.

After graduating with a degree in fisheries biology from the University of Washington, he joined the department in the early 1970s as a game warden.

At 5-foot-8, Richards' wiry frame reveals a lifetime spent outdoors. He's not one for formalities. His demeanor is gruff, candid. He grouses about pressure in the department nowadays for officers to look "spit-shined."

"I'll be honest with you. I'm not their ideal officer, I'm not their poster boy. I'm bald, ugly, old. I'll get my boots dirty; I don't shine them like I should."

His colleagues say Richards, 58, is the first to shinny up a tree after an animal in distress. Through the years, he's had his share of close encounters. He's been shot at by angry fishermen and was almost killed by a cougar protecting her kittens.

But he focuses on the upside of the job, those privileged moments when he sees things few people ever do. Like the time he discovered two newborn bear cubs in a den. They were so delicate that he could hold them in the palm of each hand.

If Richards finds an injured animal, he'll bring it home to recover before releasing it into nature, says his wife of 38 years, Jane Richards. The couple live in Enumclaw.

"We've had fawns, cougar kittens, red-tail hawks," she says. "He would rather heal them and let them be wild animals again."

A few years ago, Richards was helping to catch a treed female bear near Ravensdale in South King County. The bear fell to the ground after being shot with a tranquilizer dart and stopped breathing. Richards blew in her nose for several minutes to keep her alive until they reached the vet.

Sometimes when he has a tranquilized bear in a trap, Richards will drop by an elementary school and let the students feel its fur and hear its heartbeat.

His wife saves the thank-you letters the children write. Someday, they say, they want to be like him.

Peaceful coexistence?

On a warm July morning, Richards heads to the Issaquah Highlands to check on a bear trap. The development echoes of young families and money. It's not a backdrop that invokes wildlife.

"If you look here, you think, 'Bear, schmare,' " Richards says, pointing to a row of new town houses.

He gets out of his truck and walks into the woods behind some homes where he finds a path of strewn garbage. Discarded yogurt cups, pop bottles and open tuna cans — classic bear work, he says.

Just then, an irritated property manager approaches Richards.

"I've called your department several times and nobody's done anything about the bears," says the man, who didn't want to be identified.

"We've been out here trying to take care of it," Richards replies. "People have to remember they can't leave any food out. The bears will keep coming back."

A neighbor overhears the conversation. "I don't know why we can't just feed the bears," she says. "Maybe then they'll go away."

The comment frustrates Richards but doesn't surprise him. Many people who encounter bears react with either unwarranted fear or an unsettling naiveté.

"People don't understand," he says later. "They think they're helping. But the bears have to stay wild."

Richards is convinced that humans and bears can coexist on suburbia's fringe. But it means residents must be more aware of the wildlife around them.

"You can live with them if you get in the habit of bear-proofing things," he says. "If you don't want to be around bears, live in an apartment in downtown Seattle."

The animals won't be an issue here forever, he adds. Eventually, the area will get so built out that they will be pushed farther away or die.

"The competition for a food source is tough out there," he says. "If you lose the habitat, then you lose the wildlife."

Sonia Krishnan: 206-515-5546 or skrishnan@seattletimes.com