A black bear swimming at North Park and other bears visiting Stanton Heights and Franklin Park are among more than 40 reports of bear sightings in Allegheny County since May 1.

This is not unusual.

“I don’t think there are any more bears passing through Allegheny County than usual,” said Lt. Andy Harvey, a game warden and information and education supervisor at the Pennsylvania Game Commission’s Southwest Region office in Bolivar. “People have trail and home security cameras catching anything walking through their yards.”

And in densely populated areas such as Allegheny County, multiple people report seeing the same animal.

Bears showing up in the county, in places where they don’t live, happens this time of year. Mature females are pushing away their young born more than a year ago, known as “yearlings.”

“In June and July, the yearlings are kicked out because their mom wants to breed again to have cubs early next year,” Harvey said.

Sows breed every two years; June and July are their mating season.

The young bears are like teenagers, on the loose looking for new territory. The mature males, meanwhile, are out hunting for females.

The abundant greenspace both within and surrounding Allegheny County provides a corridor to find a new home or a mate. That’s when they turn up in Pittsburgh’s urban and suburban neighborhoods.

“Understand, bears are in the area and are passing through now,” Harvey said.

Bears are here, or not too far away

Where are these bears coming from?

Bears live in the wooded outskirts of Allegheny County such as in Frazer and other outlying communities.

There are also healthy bear populations in surrounding counties.

“Westmoreland has quite a few. Somerset, Fayette and Armstrong counties have some of the highest populations in the region,” Harvey said.

It’s not rare to have a bear more than 500 pounds in counties where the bear population is higher, he added.

“Bears have a great sense of direction and will get back to where they came from,” Harvey said.

The game commission does not field every report it receives about a bear sighting. It handles only nuisance bears, ones that linger too long, by setting traps — often with doughnut or other baked goods — and releasing them.

The agency prefers to teach the public how to deter bears from their properties before a problem starts. That has everything to do with food.

“We all love a good barbecue, but that smell can attract a bear,” Harvey said.

Cleaning up after grilling is one tip to deter bears. Removing outdoor pet food (especially at night) and unsecured garbage is another measure.

Bird feeders, too, are problematic.

“If there is a bear in the area, it will go after bird feeders. It’s an easy meal for them,” Harvey said.

Residents should remove their feeders for a couple of weeks after a bear visit, and the animal will move on.

Harvey lives in Somerset County, where there is a large bear population. He suggests checking your yard for bears and other wildlife, like skunks, before letting pets outside.

“Although bears are afraid of people and attacks are rare, those incidents are often attached to a dog running out,” he said.

Where did that feeder go?

I’ve been writing about these wayward bears for over two decades, yet Saturday was the first time a family member was surprised when one showed up in her yard.

One of my sisters, Rachel Rakers, dotes on her four bird feeders, with seed for finches, jelly for Baltimore orioles and sugar water for hummingbirds, outside her Franklin Park home.

It’s your typical smorgasbord in the suburbs.

While enjoying her Sunday morning coffee, she looked out her living room window and was surprised to see that one of her feeders was gone.

Did the raccoons get to it?

She checked her Ring security camera and was surprised by the culprit: a yearling black bear.

The bear stood on its hind legs, near the large dollhouse for her grandchildren. Surprisingly, the young bear didn’t knock anything down on the porch. It just pulled down a feeder.

“It wasn’t a bear-buster feeder. It was only a squirrel-buster feeder,” she said.

After checking her yard, the animal also took down a sturdy wooden post — and the large feeder that went with it.

My sister knows her bears. Formerly a Butler County resident, she was used to occasional raids by the bruins that lived in the heavily wooded area near her home.

Waking up to trash cans ripped open, garbage strewn about the yard, was an unwelcome surprise. She learned to spray down the garbage cans with bleach water as a deterrent.

Then there was the time she was delayed going to work because a bear was in the yard near her parked car.

She stopped feeding birds altogether. So when she moved to Franklin Park several years ago, she was thrilled to add bird feeders.

“I thought I was done with bear,” she said.

She had never heard of bear sightings in her Franklin Park neighborhood. “Not that it didn’t happen before. We’re not far from the Route 279 and 79 intersection, where there are a lot of woods.”

She knows the protocol of taking down all bird feeders, but she plans to resume operations in a few weeks.

Bear sightings

If someone spots a bear on their property, they don’t need to call anyone, Harvey said.

However, if a bear problem persists, call the state Game Commission Southwestern Regional office to talk to a game warden.

To learn more tips about deterring bears, the commission suggests visiting bearwise.org.

©2026 PG Publishing Co. Visit at post-gazette.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.