October/November diet

[Pizzlegreet]

What are black bears in western Washington eating this time of year? I went out in the woods and all the berry bushes were berry free. I didn’t see tons of mushrooms, but I have read that mushrooms are on the menu this time of year. My friend has a bear cam and there is a bear that comes and goes every day or two; so they are around. Another friend has bears in his yard sniffing around.

What are they eating? We don’t really have tons of acorn trees so I’m at a loss.

 

[matchu865]

I've seen them eating ash, and also digging for grubs. However where I got my bear a few weeks ago is now likely under a few inches of snow. They probably eat much more than that, it's just what I noticed on my last trip to the N Cascades.

 

[Jtb.kfd]

In western WA they will be in the timber eating mushrooms, roots, elderberry (lasts through the snow) and digging up grubs and chipmunks. After the first heavy frosts they start to leave the mushrooms alone and will transition back to being in clearcuts/drainages more often feeding on anything they can find (frogs, grubs, certain brush, skunk cabbage etc). I always had a hard time consistently getting them on that side of the state once early September and the berries ended.

 

[Fireflyfishing]

According to Netflix, they eat cocain.

 

[Pizzlegreet]

So berry time it’s easy to find them as they are with the berries and now they are roaming/foraging in an unpredictable way and location?

 

[Jtb.kfd]

So berry time it’s easy to find them as they are with the berries and now they are roaming/foraging in an unpredictable way and location?

Well, I would say they are easier to locate during berry season but it’s not easy. Western WA is hard still as the berry season runs from late July through mid September with blackberries, huckleberries, red cap, salmon berries etc. literally everywhere. The brush is generally taller than the bears and so they can be hard to spot even while feeding. And to the second part of your post, yes later in fall they are much more unpredictable and harder to locate. The best success I had was to utilize game cameras and find their travel routes. Then build tree stands along them. It took a fair amount of scouting, camera utilization and time but their travel routes stayed consistent all year as their individual range is not that large in the lowland regions.
When you hear people finding bears on berry patches that generally happens at higher elevations in the mountains where berries patches ripen at different times/elevation. If you find the right spot, you can locate multiple bears in a patch and they will hold there until the berries turn.