Here at Friends of Animals’ headquarters in Connecticut, we’ve seen reports of bear sightings across the state roll across our desks for what feels like all summer long.

One Hartford Courant headline reads ‘Bears spotted 7,300 times in CT so far this year. What state officials say is ‘concerning’ about the animals,’ and ‘Bear sightings in Connecticut are increasing: How to stay safe, protect your home: DEEP’ says another from WTNH Hartford.

And just last month, Connecticut’s bears made national waves when on Good Morning America, a savvily-edited video made it look like a black bear was charging a little boy until a “heroic” dog intervened—but our allies at the CT Coalition to Protect Black Bears saw a longer version of the video: the bear only started running left because the dog was chasing it; the bear didn’t charge the little boy, rather it clumsily tried to escape an unleashed dog.

It’s exactly this sort of framing that frustrates Friends of Animals, whose seen, first-hand the panic these headlines stoke—we stepped in to stop a bear hunt in 2025, helped defeat bill that would make it easier for CT farmers to kill black bears in 2026, and anticipate thwarting another bill to enact a hunt in 2027.

When we killed the hunt in 2025, we took a closer look at the bear “conflict” reports that kept grabbing headlines; through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, we were able to examine each of those reports from 2024.

The FOIA request revealed that of all “conflicts” in Connecticut in 2024, 654 involved bird feeders, 1,563 involved trash cans, and 133 involved livestock (mostly chickens). And of the 39 home entries from April 8-June 30, 2024 (there were 69 total that year), most were easily avoidable if residents had followed just a few easy steps to secure their property.

These details matter. In June 2024, while Salisbury homeowners were napping upstairs, a sow pushed through a screened-in porch and entered through a kitchen door left wide open.

The more we examine the data, public narratives match reality less.

Sensational stories may grab readers’ attention, but they reinforce the defective belief that bears in Connecticut are a problem that ought to be managed—with bullets. In reality, what we continually saw in those FOIA-requested break ins was that what really needs to be managed is human behavior that invites bears into their homes.

Friends of Animals supports bear-resistant trash cans and electric fencing and supports the mandated removal of bird feeders from property (CT DEEP already asks residents to take down bird feeders from March-November). It’s critical that CT residents don’t unintentionally lure bears to their yards with trash, bird feeders, and other attractants.

It’s what we told lawmakers in 2025 and 2026, and it’s what we’ll tell them again in 2027.

Without better public education, and without removing bears’ access to these attractants, we’re only bound to read more dramatic headlines about sightings, which we know are flimsy and inherently inflated.

It’s all too easy for an isolated sighting to take on a life and a narrative of its own.

Just last week, another local encounter was in the news, as CBS New York reported a bigfoot sighting by a Rhode Island man in Connecticut’s Pachaug State Forest. According to the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization, it’s a highly credible sighting, and the 22^nd bigfoot sighting in the state.

FoA only wonders how long it’ll be before we’re in Hartford testifying against a bigfoot hunt.