With grizzly bears being a very controversial topic in Montana and surrounding areas, why is Montana shipping more grizzly bears to Yellowstone?
Check out this excerpt from an article by Chelsey Cook via Wide Open Spaces:
Most people equate Yellowstone with active and abundant wildlife, including grizzly bears. So, it may be surprising to hear that Montana has announced plans to start trucking more bears into Yellowstone and the surrounding area.
This move isn’t just to scare tourists: Officials hope that bringing new grizzlies in from the nearby Northern Continental Divide Ecosystem will boost the genetic diversity among the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem bears.
You see, while grizzlies have made leaps and strides in increasing their population from roughly 700 in 1975 across the 48 contiguous states to a whopping near-2,000, our grizzly bear population now faces a new threat: a lack of genetic diversity.
Read the full article here.