Can Drones and Metallica Help Prevent Bear Conflicts in Montana?

Montana is known for many things, and bears are definitely one of them. You can't visit a campsite in the state without seeing signs reminding visitors to be 'bear aware. The more people that visit, camp, and hunt in Montana the more we are bound to see bear interactions.

Montana wildlife officials are thinking outside the box to find ways to deter grizzly bears from certain areas. Recently they have started using drones to annoy the bears and get them to move on. The goal is to get the bears to associate drones with humans and to avoid those areas. They have used speakers on the drones and have yelled at the bears, and it seems to be working.

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According to the Cowboy State Daily, Montana isn't the only state that has started to use drones with the purpose of cutting down on bear and human interactions. Wyoming has also been using drones to haze, or scare away, bears. However, there was one notable case where using a drone failed to work. A black bear was in a tree in Golden, Colorado and officials blasted Black Sabbath's 'Iron Man' at the bear, but it didn't work. A woman in British Columbia did discover that Metallica can scare away a mountain lion.

The concern is that the grizzly bears can get used to the drones over time, because of their intelligence. Humans will continue to have to adjust and find new ways of hazing the bears when needed.

When I started in radio I worked overnights, I had ranchers call and tell me that they played the radio at night to keep the predators away from their animals. If the Montana wildlife officials are looking for volunteers I would be happy to lend my voice to the effort. Some people still think my voice is effective at hazing all kinds of wildlife.