Residents may have distinct challenges for securing and removing bear attractants including trash, bird feeders, gardens, livestock, fruit trees, pet foods, etc. around their properties. Bear Smart Durango, with its partners, focuses on a spectrum of private property projects geared toward providing interested property owners materials, information and conflict response to create site specific solutions to securing bear attractants and minimizing risk of bear conflict.
In addition to phone and email consultations with residents, onsite property consultations are provided for county and city residents. Typical consultations are informal conversations to help brainstorm ideas for strategies that would allow landowners to lower their risk of bear conflict. A wonderful opportunity for these conversations comes upon delivery of a bear-resistant container. The goal of the consultations is to consider bear attractant security without ignoring landowner preferences.
Any collaboration with private property owners may come by a variety of means such as landowner interest or response to a bear conflict, providing advice on securing bear attractants: bringing in bird feeders at night, loan of a bear-resistant container, removal of unused fruit, assistance in building an electric fence to safeguard stored livestock grains, and installing remote motion sensor activated cameras to monitor bear conflict are examples of collaboration with private property owners.
In 2012, Bear Smart Durango consulted with 24 property owners onsite.