Alabama’s black bear record is thin: 60 records scattered across 21 counties, with the heaviest clusters in Mobile County at the southern end of the state and Cherokee County in the northeast corner. That split mirrors the bear’s real foothold here, two small, widely separated remnants of a species that once ranged the whole of Alabama.
Two holdouts of a once-widespread animal
Bears were nearly eliminated from Alabama by the early twentieth century, and the map still reflects that history. The northeast cluster sits in the folded ridges around Little River Canyon National Preserve and the Cheaha Wilderness, while the southern records lean on the longleaf and bottomland forests near the Florida line, including Conecuh National Forest. A black bear needs big blocks of cover and a steady rotation of foods, acorns, soft mast, insects, and carrion, and these are the landscapes that still supply them at a scale most of the state no longer does.
An active summer, a quiet den season
Records climb to their strongest in June and July, when bears travel widely and yearlings leave their mothers, and hold a smaller rise in November as bears feed heavily ahead of winter denning. Even in midsummer, an Alabama bear is a rare thing to meet; most people who live or hike in the state’s bear country never see one, and an encountered bear is usually already moving away.
Status in Alabama
NatureServe ranks the American black bear S2, Imperiled, in Alabama, a rank that reflects how small and isolated the state’s remaining population is. The species is native to its Alabama range, and USGS NAS does not list it as nonindigenous here.
Full species profile
