RE-ESTABLISHING THE BLACK BEAR

It’s becoming increasingly more common to see black bears throughout East Tennessee. In fact, there are two main black bear populations that can be found in this area: the Appalachian population along the Tennessee-North Carolina border and the Cumberland population in the northern part of the Cumberland Plateau along the Tennessee-Kentucky border. These populations are growing, and the recolonization of their former range, including the Cumberland Plateau, continues due to the climate warming, hunting laws that have been put into place, and parks that have started providing protection. This is important because the Cumberland Plateau could thrive ecologically if we pushed for the reintroduction of this apex predator back into their natural habitats. The problem is that the Cumberland Plateau is progressively becoming more populated due to the low cost of living and is therefore becoming more developed and fragmented. Because of this, I have chosen to look at the Cumberland Plateau as a series of wildlife corridors to repair the plateau so that it acts as a migration corridor for all species to take some stress off the Appalachian Mountains. To navigate through the path of least resistance, I chose to build a wildlife bridge in Ozone, a mostly vacant rural town on the Eastern Escarpment, because it bisects I-40 and is rich in public land acreage that the black bears already partially occupy. Not only did I want to bridge these fragmented areas, but I also wanted to allow people to observe the crossing wildlife in a safe manner for everyone involved, so I created an observation deck that people could ascend into which is accessible from an existing road.  Re-establishing this keystone species on the Cumberland Plateau is crucial due to the fact that they are seed dispersers and overall ecosystem engineers.