A mysterious illness that kills a young California bear in Tahoe. One Symptomatology: Fearless | National

Bear cubs show the behavior (not afraid to be around humans) that is manifesting in bears around the state due to a mysterious and deadly condition in which the brain becomes dangerously inflamed. I did.

Scientists have discovered five new viruses in some of the symptomatological bears, but it’s unclear if the virus is the cause of the disease.

Scientists’ suspicions were confirmed when a veterinarian tested Tahoe Bear after being captured shortly after a snowboarder filmed Tahoe at Truckee’s North Star Resort in 2019.

In the last 12 months alone, authorities have captured three other bears in the same condition, according to state veterinarians. This has been recorded by California and Nevada biologists in the region’s black bears since 2014.

Bears usually move away from humans. Even the densely populated bears of the Tahoe Basin have lost much of their fear of humans and usually take off when approaching while walking in residential areas.

However, young bears with these diseases do not escape.

The latest bear in this situation was a 21-pound woman captured by a biologist at Pollock Pines last fall. The sick and confused bear was not afraid of humans who began to feed it with mercy. At some point, it jumped into the trunk of an open car, state wildlife officials said.

The bear, which should have weighed nearly 80 pounds at that age, was covered with mites when it was finally captured and taken to the Wildlife Research Institute of the Fish and Wildlife Service.

Like almost every bear caught with the same symptoms, such as a quivering head or a slight tilt of the head, the bear was very ill and the vet had to take it down.

People not considered at risk, scientists say

Bears with inflamed brains were found far from Lake Tahoe’s Nevada side and Humboldt County.

Jamie Sherman, a veterinarian studying bear disease at the University of California, Davis, said the new virus in some of the affected bears does not appear to pose a risk to people.

So far, anything that makes these bears sick seems to have had little effect on California’s growing population of Asiatic black bears.

Asiatic black bears are not endangered. The Tahoe region has some of the highest bear densities in the country and lives all year round with villas and campgrounds seeking human food and litter.

Bears, which are increasingly looting homes in search of simple meals, have enthusiastic local fans. Tahoe bears are seen very often, and local animal lovers name them and sometimes warn them when they die.

Sherman said that may be the reason why many bears with inflamed brains are appearing in the Lake Tahoe area. Unlike bears in the forest who get sick and die far away from humans, they often find symptomatic bears and report them to biologists.

“Wildlife managers often think that animals are very charismatic and are more likely to have symptoms if they are in a populated area where they are invested in that population.” She said.

But that said, shamans say that the way bears live in the Tahoe basin (many bears live nearby and share fluids on the same food source) makes the disease faster among the population. I warned that it was a kind of condition that allowed it to spread.

The fact that they live close to humans also increases the risk that the virus can jump over the species barrier. This is a much higher concern in public awareness after early reports associated the virus that causes COVID-19 with the wildlife-inhabited Chinese “wet market.” It will be bought and sold.

However, Sherman said a recent study of bear disease shows that the risk is negligible so far.

“The viruses they detected in these bears were not particularly known to affect humans,” Sherman said.

Sherman pointed out that wildlife, pets, and livestock are rich in viruses that are endemic to individual species that have never jumped into humans.

Thoroughly clean after contact with bears

Still, she said it would be rewarding to pay attention to the bear’s fluids.

Tahoe homeowners who have experienced bear invasion report that when bears are hunting for food, they often find their homes sprinkled with bear saliva, urine, feces, and sometimes blood. doing.

Sherman advised those who clean such mess to wear rubber gloves and perhaps a face shield if there is a risk of splattering, and use a 10% bleach solution for cleaning.

“I think there should be essentially the same risk as cleaning fluids,” she said.

Fortunately, the bear caught in the camera was sniffing the legs of the snowboarder’s pants, so the condition wasn’t too serious and had to be lowered.

The now three-year-old bear was later named Benji and moved to the Ramona campus of the San Diego Humane Society. However, it does not recover completely and requires constant veterinary care. The state wildlife authorities called it a warning story.

If the bear is returned to the wild, it cannot survive. Benji may require lifelong treatment. This means that one day you are spending space and resources available to treat other animals that have shots. Return to their natural home.

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