Texas Fauna Project

American Black Bear

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Raymond Skiles worked at Big Bend National Park for nearly 40 years, and during that time dealt with efforts to reduce human/bear conflicts. When breeding bears began to appear in Big Bend in the late 1980s, Skiles sought to learn from earlier bad experiences at Yosemite, Yellowstone, Glacier and other parks hosting bears. As a result, Big Bend introduced bear-resistant trash cans, fenced landfills, hardened cabin doors, signage, articles, rules, and other measures to ensure that the bears and humans could safely coexist in the Park.