If it feels like every other week there's a bear sighting somewhere in the metro area, you're not imagining it. Colorado Parks and Wildlife has logged 6,129 bear reports statewide between January 1 and August 13 this year. That's nearly double the 3,115 reports from the same stretch in 2025, and already more than all of 2025's full-year total of 5,299. Denver's part of that: the metro area has seen more than 800 sightings this year, roughly triple what it saw over the same period last year.
Why they're coming down out of the mountains
The driver is drought. A late May freeze and a dry, low-snowpack summer hit the berries, nuts, and native plants bears rely on before winter, and wildfires have burned through even more of what was left. Right about now, black bears enter what wildlife officials call hyperphagia — a stretch of late summer and fall where they'll spend up to 20 hours a day foraging to pack on fat for hibernation. When the natural food isn't there, they go looking elsewhere, and "elsewhere" increasingly means trash cans, bird feeders, and open garages in neighborhoods that used to feel bear-free.
It's not just the foothills anymore
This year's sightings have shown up well inside city limits. A bear was spotted in a tree near South Pennsylvania and Louisiana in Platt Park in August — a few blocks from Washington Park, Sushi Den, and McKinley-Thatcher Elementary. Bears have also turned up in Harvey Park and Marston, both miles from the mountains. One Denver-area barbecue restaurant, Hickory House, has dealt with a bear stopping by on a roughly weekly basis, drawn in by the smokers.
The stakes go beyond a startling photos for the neighborhood group chat. Colorado has recorded six bear attacks so far this year, four of them within a single week in August. One happened in Jefferson County, southwest of Denver, where a subadult bear attacked a man hiking back to his car near the North Fork trail — he needed hospital treatment for leg injuries, and wildlife officers later located and euthanized the bear.
What actually helps
CPW's guidance hasn't changed, it's just more urgent this year: secure trash and recycling until pickup morning, bring in bird feeders during bear season, keep pet food indoors, and clean grills and store them somewhere a bear can't get into. If you see a bear in your neighborhood, call it in (Denver's CPW office is at 303-291-7227). Officials have said the calls that come after a bear's already hit its third or fourth house in a week are much harder to act on than the first one. Colorado also strengthened enforcement this year against people who knowingly leave food or waste out that attracts bears, so this isn't just a suggestion anymore.
My take
I bring this up because it's genuinely relevant if you're buying or already living in a neighborhood near open space, greenbelts, or foothills-adjacent parks — which, in Denver, is a lot of neighborhoods. If you're touring homes near Wash Park, the Highline Canal, or anywhere backing up to a park or trail system, ask about trash storage, whether there's a shed or garage for cans, and how the HOA (if there is one) handles bear-attractant rules. It's a small thing to think about during a home search, but it's the kind of small thing that makes a real difference in whether you end up dealing with a 300-pound visitor in your backyard.
Mostly, though, this is just a good year to take the basics seriously — secure the trash, bring in the feeders, and give bears the space and the calories to get through winter without needing yours.
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