Cherry Creek School District is only in its second week of classes, and already officials have sent out eight bear-sighting notifications to seven different schools. Last year, the district's 66 schools had no bear sightings at all, making this year's run of alerts feel like an entirely new normal for students, parents, and staff.
The notifications have hit campuses across the district, including High Plains Elementary, Cottonwood Creek Elementary, Walnut Hills Elementary, and Cherry Creek High School, all of which received alerts around August 17. Belleview Elementary and Greenwood Elementary followed with notifications of their own. When a bear is spotted near a campus, the district's response is to keep students and staff inside buildings until authorities give the all-clear, according to Denver7. Walnut Hills Elementary experienced a delayed dismissal on August 21 because of one such alert.
Cherry Creek High School junior Iv Collier, who has attended the school for three years, said they had never experienced a bear sighting at the school before this year and described going through a secure perimeter after a bear was seen nearby. Cherry Creek Community Schools superintendent Lauren Snell called the run of bear activity “not normal,” per the same Denver7 report. Collier said they had previously noticed possums and skunks on campus, but nothing like this, and is now studying why bears are showing up in the area, telling the outlet they hope the research can help improve bears' natural environment.
A Statewide Surge, Not Just a Cherry Creek Problem
The district's experience is unfolding against a historic statewide spike. Colorado Parks and Wildlife has logged more than 6,000 bear sightings so far this year, nearly double last year's tally over the same stretch, the agency told Denver7. Statewide, reports reached 6,129 by mid-August, compared with 3,115 during the same period a year earlier, according to The Colorado Sun.
The Denver metro area has seen an even sharper jump, with wildlife officials recording over 800 bear sightings and conflict reports through late August, nearly triple last year's count over the same window, as reported by Westword. Wildlife managers say bears are wandering farther east into suburban corridors as they search for calories, and parts of the Cherry Creek School District sit within Arapahoe County, where a bear was found perched in a backyard tree on a South Centennial block on July 20, prompting a temporary road closure in an earlier Hoodline incident nearby.
Drought, Wildfires and a Race for Calories
Demetria Wright, per Denver7, said this year's drought and wildfires have decimated bears' food supply, and a lack of snowpack from the previous winter created a scarcity of resources for bears in the wild. That environmental squeeze coincides with hyperphagia, the biological state in which black bears forage up to 20 hours a day and consume as many as 20,000 calories before hibernation, according to The Cherry Creek News, which notes that nearly half of all annual bear conflicts occur during August, September, and October.
Unsecured garbage was the top trigger behind Colorado's human-bear conflicts in 2025, accounting for 57 percent of the state's 2,448 property-damage incidents, followed by livestock and coops at 18 percent and bird seed or pet food at 16 percent, per GearJunkie. Colorado is home to an estimated 17,000 to 20,000 black bears, and the state has no native grizzly bear population, the outlet notes. In response to the surge, a new state law, House Bill 26-1342, took effect August 12, making it illegal to knowingly leave food or trash accessible to bears, eliminating mandatory warnings for first-time offenders, and raising fines for repeat violations to $5,000, according to the Colorado Sun.
Bear Encounters Reach Denver Neighborhoods and a College Campus
The pressure on bears to find food has pushed sightings well beyond mountain foothills. On August 23, Colorado Parks and Wildlife tranquilized and relocated a young black bear found in a tree in Denver's Platt Park neighborhood, just blocks from McKinley-Thatcher Elementary School, Westword reported. Separately, Denver7 reported that CPW returned a 1.5-year-old, 100-pound male black bear to safer habitat near Platt Park on August 24, with a CPW spokesperson saying the bear was likely looking for food.
Colorado State University's Fort Collins campus was placed on a two-hour safety alert on August 18 after a black bear roamed near Eddy Hall during freshman move-in week, with campus police and wildlife officers safely tranquilizing and removing the animal, as Hoodline reported at the time. Statewide, the consequences for habituated bears can be severe: Colorado Parks and Wildlife euthanized 78 bears and relocated 52 others across the state in 2025 following conflicts and food-conditioning incidents, per Newsweek, since state policy requires mandatory euthanasia for bears involved in attacks or severe aggression.
What To Do If You Encounter a Bear
Wildlife officials urge people to avoid surprising bears around dawn and dusk, when the animals are most active. If a bear is encountered, people should remain calm, give it plenty of space, and use a calm, firm voice while backing away slowly, providing the bear a clear way to leave. Officials also advise against running or climbing a tree, guidance Denver7 relayed alongside the district's own notifications to families.
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