Why didn’t Grizzly bears extend their range into the east say 400 years ago before large scale development? Not enough food on the Great Plains?
I was watching that show on the history channel last night, “After Humans” and they were talking about how fast animal populations can expand given an opportunity. So I’m thinking what kept the Grizzly to the western half of N. America? I am assuming that developed areas keep them locked into the Rockies now.
A quick read of this wiki entry shows that, indeed, their historical range did not include the eastern US. I’m guessing, just from reading this related article that the reason is that that part of the continent was more ideally suited to the black bear.
They probably never got past the bison buffet in the middle part of the continent.
Stephen Colbert.
It’s the arrangement that Chuck Norris and the grizzly population have come to over the years. They split up the continent 50-50.
Maybe no grizzlies here in the northeast, but there are black bears in my area.
Grizzly Bears like their Salmon fresh.
Following up on Ponder’s post–Grizzlies are better suited to open areas. Black bears are better suited to more heavily forested areas. It looks as though the grizzlies did, at one time, live on the Great Plains as well as the Rockies, but they were never able to successfully exploit the densely forested Eastern US.
Why has no one let ME in on this little piece of info?
Get back across the Mississippi, you!
I already AM across…on the EAST side.
Did some rivers in Maine have salmon runs before human distruption?
I don’t know about salmon, but many east coast rivers once had large runs of shad.
Some still do, but the numbers are tiny these days. 