Can Humans Live With 'Maneaters'?

May 23, 2005 -- -- There was a time, not too long ago, when if you wanted to see a cougar or a bear, you'd have to go out into the wilderness. Now, in more and more parts of the country, you might not have to leave your back yard to find a predator big enough to eat you for dinner.

Animals that a few decades ago were considered nearly extinct in most of the United States have responded so well to the protections put in place that now even people in suburban areas of some parts of the country have had run-ins with brown bears and cougars.

At the same time, more and more people have been moving to parts of the country that were formerly wild, essentially moving into predators' neighborhoods. Even more than that, some naturalists say, people create environments that attract not only herbivores like squirrels and deer and small predators like fox and coyote, but big predators as well.

"We have set up an environment that encourages these predators to come into our communities," said David Baron, the author of "Beast in the Garden," which uses the fatal mountain lion attack on a jogger in Boulder, Colo., to examine the interaction between humans and predators.

"Bears prefer to live in the city because life is so much easier," Baron said. "They become fatter and lazier, because there's so much food and they get so many more calories. It's the same with the mountain lions and the deer. We've created these lush communities that draw deer, and that draws mountain lions."

What exacerbates the situation, according to some people, is that having been protected for so many years, these big predators have lost their fear of humans. They do not see people as "alpha predators" they need to fear. Once humans reassert themselves by hunting these animals, the argument goes, the beasts will leave the garden and leave humans alone.

Some biologists suggest there is a basis for this belief.

"If deer or elk are hunted, they become very shy," said David Klein, a professor of biology at the University of Alaska. "When they're not, they don't see humans as threats. It's the same with bears."

Animal protection groups and some naturalists, however, dispute this idea.

"If you hunt a bear and you kill it, that bear hasn't learned anything," Baron said, but he said he believes "hunting has a role" in keeping animals out of the suburbs.

"Hunting is part of the answer, but it's not the only answer," he said.

David Quammen, the other of "Monster of God: The Man-Eating Predator in the Jungles of History and the Mind," suggests that approach might even have a negative effect, because it would take "the biggest and boldest cats out of the gene pool, and those that are left are less afraid of humans."