The trend is tied to a hunting regulation that protects family groups from hunters. It's illegal to shoot mother or cubs when they are together.

    "For females, if you leave your cubs at one year and a half, then you become a target during the next hunting season," explains Pelletier. But "if you stay for a bit longer with your cubs, you're protected an extra year. The hunting is filtering out the females that keep their young for a smaller amount of time."

    The analysis used decades of data collected from tagged brown bears in Sweden — the European cousins of North American grizzly bears. But the findings may be applicable outside Scandinavia, in any place where hunting rates are high. Hunting policies that protect mothers with cubs are widespread. In the U.S., many states have such laws in place for a variety of game animals.



extra_nos:

The conclusion in this article almost made it seem like the bears are using an "if this, then that" sort of logic. Only one line was really clear

    The hunting is filtering out the females that keep their young for a smaller amount of time.
Females that were already staying with their young longer for some other reason are who continue to survive and thrive.

Another striking comment

    Last year, Congress rolled back a law that banned killing bears and wolves in their family dens on 16 federally owned Alaskan wildlife refuges.
This seems very un-sportsman like, and since neither bears nor wolves are a necessary source of food, even for those who rely on hunting, I don't see the point. Who wants to brag about taking a trophy animal that was hiding in its den? That eliminates any skill or challenge that would have been gained.

posted 2214 days ago