{"id":836641,"date":"2026-09-04T21:48:14","date_gmt":"2026-09-04T21:48:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/836641\/"},"modified":"2026-09-04T21:48:14","modified_gmt":"2026-09-04T21:48:14","slug":"montana-fwp-warns-of-increased-bear-sightings-urges-residents-to-secure-trash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/836641\/","title":{"rendered":"Montana FWP warns of increased bear sightings, urges residents to secure trash"},"content":{"rendered":"

BILLINGS \u2014 Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks (FWP) is urging residents to secure trash due to an increase in black bear sightings in Billings this year.<\/p>\n

MTN reported on a black bear sighting<\/a> in Lockwood in June. Other sightings have been common on the outskirts of Billings and near the Yellowstone River, according to FWP.<\/p>\n

\"Screenshot<\/p>\n

Courtesy Jay Cormier<\/p>\n

Black bear in Lockwood<\/p>\n

FWP communications manager Chrissy Webb said there have been more bear sightings in Billings this year due to a shortage of bear food sources, such as chokecherries.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s really just kind of an act of desperation for these bears, to try to make sure that they’re still getting the food because they’re not able to find it from those food sources that are more natural to them,\u201d said Webb.<\/p>\n

Webb urges Billings neighbors to lock their garbage in their garage and take down bird feeders to keep bears from returning.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour behavior should change a little bit, so we don’t have a situation like Red Lodge, where there’s bears getting into garbage nightly,\u201d said Webb.<\/p>\n

You can find more information on how to avoid attracting bears here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BILLINGS \u2014 Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks (FWP) is urging residents to secure trash due to an increase…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":836642,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[79,201],"class_list":["post-836641","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-science","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/836641","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=836641"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/836641\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/836642"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=836641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=836641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=836641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}