In March of 2013, three tiny black bear cubs were found in a cardboard box alongside a road in South Carolina. The cubs were so small, weighing just under 3 pounds each, the firefighter who found them thought they might be puppies. At first, it looked like they didn’t have much of a chance to survive. But then they found a new, temporary home in Tennessee at the Appalachian Bear Rescue, where they received around the clock care. As Wild Side Guide Ken Tucker found out, it’s not the first time injured or orphaned bears have found new life there, always with the hope that they will return to the wild.
As a nonprofit organization, Appalachian Bear Rescue is always in need of help, especially when it comes to finding food for the bears. You can visit their website here to find out how you can help. Over the past 17 years, Appalachian Bear Rescue has cared for more than 190 black bears that have come there for rehabilitation. We would like to thank them and all the volunteers who have worked so hard over the years to help protect these amazing animals!
It’s always important to remember that bears are wild animals…powerful by nature…and whether they intend to or not, they can hurt you if you get to close. So please, admire these beautiful animals, but do so from a distance. (In the Great Smoky Mountains National Park it is illegal to purposely get within 50 yards of a bear.) And never, ever feed bears. Feeding a bear is often a death sentence for that animal. Bears that are fed become habituated to people and their surroundings, increasing the possibility of conflict situations…property damage by bears seeking food, indadvertant injury of a person, or a vehicle accident that could cause injury or death to both the people in the car and the bear.
Here are a few websites you can visit to learn more about bears: Bear Smart, TWRA, National Park Service.
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