Montana Fish, Wlidlife and Parks have received multiple reports of people seeing grizzly bear tracks in the upper Blackfoot area. Wildlife Management Specialist Jamie Jonkel says it is not uncommon to see bear activity this early in the year.

“Every year that last week in March I start getting reports of one or two grizzlies that start traveling around,” said Jonkel. “30 or 50 people see the tracks so automatically everyone thinks there are a lot of grizzlies out, but usually it is just one big male covering the country, looking for winter kill, road kill, that kind of thing.”

According to Jonkel, there has not been a lot of bear activity up to this point.

“April 1 though is the date we tell folks that they should start cleaning up, keeping their garbage contained, take down bird feeders, get the electric fence up and going around the chicken coops, that kind of thing,” Jonkel said. “Most of the bears really don’t start coming out until that last week in April.”

Jonkel says many of the bears are still spending most of their time close to the den, but folks should expect to see more and more bear activity as May approaches.

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