A bear wandered into the Aspen Saturday Market before dawn on Sept. 26 and helped itself to bread at a vendor's booth, prompting police and state wildlife officers to haze the animal out of downtown, according to UPI.
The bear got into supplies at the Louis Swiss bread booth during vendor setup, then climbed a nearby tree as officers arrived. Joey Livingston, a spokesman for Colorado Parks and Wildlife, said a CPW officer rushed to the scene to assist as Aspen police worked to move the animal along; the bear eventually left the area on its own. No injuries were reported, and video of the encounter spread quickly on social media.
The incident is one of a record number of bear-human encounters logged across Colorado this year, which wildlife officials attribute to extreme drought conditions that have thinned the natural berry and acorn crops bears rely on heading into hibernation season. With less food available in the backcountry, hungry bears have ranged further into towns in search of calories, often drawn by trash, bird feeders, and, in this case, a market stall.
The state recently distributed $1 million to Colorado communities, including those in the Roaring Fork Valley around Aspen, to fund bear-resistant trash containers and other measures meant to reduce the kinds of conflicts that have become increasingly common this fall.
Aspen, ringed by national forest land, sees periodic bear activity downtown most autumns as the animals forage before denning up, but wildlife officers say this year's drought has made encounters both more frequent and more brazen, with bears showing less hesitation about approaching people and vehicles to reach food. The Saturday Market, which runs through early October, has in past years posted signs reminding vendors to secure food waste overnight.
State wildlife officials have urged residents and visitors statewide to secure food, trash and compost through the fall, warning that a bear which grows accustomed to human food sources is far more likely to become a repeat visitor, and in persistent cases, to be relocated or euthanized under state protocols.