COLLEGE PARK, Md. (7News) — A University of Maryland Department of Environmental Science and Technology research team is partnering with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources and the Maryland Zoo to determine how many black bears are in the state, where they’re coming from, where they’re headed, and their paths in between.
“I think it’s fair to say that at some level, we have an expanding population,” explained Wildlife Ecologist and UMD Associate Prof. Jennifer Mullinax, Ph.D. “That might not necessarily mean that we’ve had bears have more bears than they did in the past, but it certainly would be a kind of logical conclusion. We just don’t quite have the data to say that, so that was really the purpose of this project.”
One bear researchers have been tracking was spotted in a residential neighborhood in Herndon last June. The bear first had been collared with a tracker in Silver Spring, then he was released farther north and west, then he crossed the Potomac River to get to Herndon, explained Mullinax…