An Incline Village resident feeding a bear by hand.
An Incline Village woman is the first person to be issued a warning under a new Nevada law prohibiting the feeding of black bears.
Jane Green received a formal warning from game wardens, according to Nevada Department of Wildlife spokesman Chris Healy.
“We’ve issued a warning for feeding mule deer, but this is the first time anyone has received a warning for feeding black bears,” he said.
The law under which Green was cited went into effect Oct. 1.
“This is a big problem,” Healy said. “You can leave the bears wild or you can domesticate them by feeding them. We’re kind of appalled that people would do this. They’re doing nothing to save the bears. It actually isn’t doing anything to save the bears. It actually sets more bears up for more trouble.”
On Dec. 19, game wardens killed one of the bears that Green had fed, Healy said.
“We’re hoping we can get some people to use the Operation Game Thief number to alert us to people feeding bears,” he said.
The male bear was euthanized in Incline Village after it was identified as one that had been breaking into cars, at least one home and some garages.
“The bear’s behavior was disturbing because it had no fear of humans while at the same time it was very destructive to property and potentially dangerous to people,” Healy said at the time.
