The Louisiana black bear was apparently driven out of Mississippi, southern Arkansas, and eastern Texas by land clearing and hunting. In Louisiana, its last stronghold, the bear has been on retreat for the last 100 years as people have cut down forests to grow sugar cane, cotton, and soybeans, and to satisfy demands for timber. Within Louisiana, the bear is found only in a few remaining areas. Rapid destruction of habitat around these small enclaves threatens many of its species, and the few bears that remain have been splintered into groups that can no longer reach each other to breed.
Opportunities to see the Louisiana black bear have grown rarer over the last century and soon could be gone forever. Most experts estimate that only 200 to 300 of the animals survive, fewer than their distant cousins, the grizzly bear. Though Louisiana black bears are physically capable of killing a human very easily, it is their nature to shy away from people.
There is something special about the Louisiana black bear that has ingrained it in the literature and folklore of Louisiana and Mississippi. In his classic novel, The Bear, William Faulkner depicts a wizened animal that is king of the wilderness. The almost omniscient bear is seen through the eyes of a boy who hunts yet passes up an opportunity to shoot the beast when it stands before him.
