In a metropolis the place paparazzi snapshots of elusive celebrities draw the eye of tens of millions of adoring followers, a picture of a seemingly smiling Los Angeles heavyweight, overlooking the twinkling lights of Pasadena, is about to go viral.
Underneath stars within the mountains overlooking the San Gabriel Valley, wildlife photographer Johanna Turner captured an indelible picture of a real-life bear showing to pose for a photograph.
The picture, taken with a path cam in late April, may have solely been captured remotely, Turner wrote on Fb: “No means anybody’s getting that shut in individual.”
The bear seems to be climbing onto a plateau on the San Gabriel Mountains, a smile on its face, with the lights of Hollywood and Los Angeles shining beneath.
She wrote that she named the file “BrownHappyBear” due to the obvious smile on the black bear’s face.
The picture was taken “inside the a part of the Angeles Nationwide Forest that was just lately added to the San Gabriel Nationwide Monument standing by the Biden administration,” Turner wrote in correspondence with The Occasions.
“So this bear now has some added funding to guard his habitat which is nice,” she wrote, “for an space with lots of leisure human use.”
Turner shared suggestions from the California Division of Fish and Wildlife on methods to work together with bears in nature.
“Canine can startle or scare bears and provoke defensive behaviors,” in keeping with the state company web site, so canine ought to be stored on a leash on trails.
As Southern California’s climate warms, bears typically enterprise into developed areas in quest of meals and water. Black bears, just like the one captured within the picture, are typically much less harmful to people than the grizzly depicted on the state flag.
If encountering a black bear within the wild, hikers ought to slowly again away and keep away from eye contact whereas making themselves look greater and making noise, in keeping with the California Division of Fish and Wildlife.
Usually, although, it’s people who’ve encroached on the black bears’ habitats and put them in hurt’s means.
“As our human inhabitants expands into wildlife habitat, human-wildlife interactions have elevated,” the state company writes. “Some folks don’t understand the hurt in feeding wild animals or stopping entry to attractants.”
