Spotted in Cornwall: the three bears

CORNWALL - 'Tis the season for bear spottings, especially mamas and their cubs. At Jan Tenney's West Cornwall home, bear carvings, many of them life-sized, celebrate one of her frequent visitors. But she was still surprised at about 7 p.m. last Saturday evening by the scene through her picture window.

When her cat, Angel, went "berserk," Tenney turned around to see a mother black bear and not one, not two, but three cubs.

"It was the first time I've seen triplets," she said.

Heading for her camera, her movements scared them off, and even though it was still light out, she doubts she got more than a blur of dark fur as the family loped off.

She noted the adult had a red tag in one ear.

At the Department of Environmental Protection's Wildlife Division, Bob Bartholomew is the seasonal resource assistant to biologist Paul Rego, more commonly known as "the bear guy."

While Tenney's triplet glimpse may have been a first for her, Bartholomew said that the average litter is 2.1 cubs, with up to five possible.

"Five is definitely rare, but three is not unusual. We've actually noticed a lot of triplets this year," he said.

Age and size has a lot to do with the number of cubs. Bartholomew said a sow will often have one her first time, with the number increasing as she grows bigger and fatter.

"The warm winter probably had something to do with it. There was also a huge acorn crop last fall."

One thing that puzzled Bartholomew was the tag color. The colors determine the bear's age, but the red made no sense to him. Red tags are for yearlings, and would have been attached this past January or February. Those bears are too young to have offspring. Only a pair of siblings were tagged this year, and those were in Barkhamsted.

He suggested the colors can be hard to determine on a moving bear, and they do tend to change and fade as they weather. Bartholomew is guessing Tenney's bear actually had a purple tag, which means it was trapped in a developed area.