When animals encroach

When Mark Di- Luigi’s cell phone rang on the first day of his summer vacation last year, the Virginia game warden knew he would have to put on his uniform one more time before he could go fishing.

“There’s a bear in downtown Leesburg,” his boss said. “The police called, looking for you.”

Mr. DiLuigi arrived in Leesburg — the seat of Loudoun County, the fastest-growing county in the United States — to find about 20 police officers, dozens of residents, news helicopters whirring overheard and reporters “everywhere,” converging to see a 150-pound black bear perched in a sycamore tree.

“He was as happy as could be, eating leaves,” Mr. DiLuigi recalled.

This was not the first time in Mr. DiLuigi’s nine-year career that he had seen a bear in a suburban neighborhood. In fact, he said, the number has increased over the past three years.

“There are bear here,” he said. “I will tell you, there are bear here.”

Bears, deer, raccoons , foxes — even coyotes — are highly adaptable and flourish in urban environments, said Maryland official Paul Peditto, debunking the myth that most animals avoid suburbia and cities.

“People once thought that deer needed big woods and fields, but they are doing pretty well in their new landscape,” said Mr. Peditto, director of the Maryland Department of Natural Resources’ Wildlife and Heritage Foundation.

The problem, said Mr. Peditto and other authorities, is that animals are moving into communities built near woods and with gardens and shrubbery that provide ample food and shelter for them to live and multiply. As a result, the animals are spreading diseases, causing millions of dollars worth of property damage, eating pets and, in extreme cases, killing people.

Even coyotes, native to Western states, now live in every Maryland and Virginia county and have made dogs and cats a part of their regular diet. Virginia officials are so concerned that they spent about $177,000 in 2003 to control the population.

Raccoons and foxes are spreading rabies among other animals, and deer are the primary carriers of the deer tick, which is responsible for Lyme disease.

A recent report by Maryland environmental officials states that large animal populations have become a “reservoir” for diseases, parasites and maladies, such as rabies, giardias and distemper.

In March 2003, a 25-year-old Northern Virginia man became the first human to die of rabies in the state in five years. The strain of rabies that killed him was directly linked to a raccoon, authorities said. And the state has reported 133 new cases of rabies in animals since January.

Deer alone cause an estimated $18 million in property damage each year just in the D.C. metropolitan area. In Maryland, bears cause an estimated $15,000 to $20,000 worth of damage each year to farms.

“When people come into the area, they do not have a deer problem. They like seeing them,” said Doug Hotton, a deer specialist with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources. “Then [the deer] start eating plants and become a nuisance.”

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