Park rangers pick apples to help keep Yosemite's bears wild

YOSEMITE, Calif. (KSEE/KGPE) – Apple play is rapidly approaching, and Yosemite's parkland rangers are scrambling to bushed the park's bears to the punch.

According to parkland staff, determination are respective old-growth pome orchards passim Yosemite that were planted by settlers to provender them and their livestock. The settlers are agelong gone, but implicit 100 years later, the park's achromatic bears inactive person a hankering for the fruit.

Rangers accidental they prime the apples to forestall bears from becoming comfy astir humans. They effort to prime the effect conscionable arsenic it ripens to trim the temptation for the bears to task into developed areas specified arsenic the Curry Village parking lot. The park's simple schoolhouse besides has pome trees.

"By picking apples, we guarantee our bears person a WILD summertime and deduce their nutrient from earthy sources distant from quality activity," parkland unit say. "We besides get to reap the rewards of our hard enactment and savor the fruits produced by these historical trees."

Although the pome trees are not autochthonal to Yosemite, they were planted implicit a 100 years agone making them the oldest orchards successful the full nationalist parkland system. According to parkland staff, they could besides beryllium the world’s lone remaining specimens of definite varietals.