PHOTOS: NM Hiring 'Professional Bear Huggers' for Conservation Work
The New Mexico Department of Game and Fish is looking for special people to work with the state’s bears.
“Now hiring professional bear huggers,” the department wrote in a Facebook post on March 13, then specified requirements for the job. “Must have ability to hike in strenuous conditions, have the courage to crawl into a bear den, and have the trust in your coworkers to keep you safe during the process,” the post continued. Photos show conservation officers cuddling bear cubs, and an officer extracting one from its den: On its application page, the department said educational requirements for the job as a Conservation Officer is a Bachelor of Science degree in biological sciences, police science or law enforcement, natural resources conservation, ecology, or a related field.
The deadline to apply for the job is on March 30. When it comes to bears, the department said the label black bear is sometimes misleading because the state’s black bears have different color phases. Those colors range from black, brown, cinnamon, a red shade, and blonde: An adult male black bear can weigh up to 400 pounds, though the average male weighs about 250 pounds. Female black bears typically weigh between 150 and 180 pounds.
Their powerful limbs each have five toes and five short, curved claws for digging and cutting.
Their front feet are about as long as they are wide, but the hind feet are long and narrow and resemble a human foot. Black bears have strong muscular necks and are very adept climbers. Black bears can scramble up a tree with remarkable ease! The bears can live more than 30 years, and “In New Mexico, bears have been documented to live 20-25 years. In most of their range where they are hunted the average life span is about 7-8 years,” the site continued. Meanwhile, one social media user who commented on the department’s job posting wrote, “I would cuddle bears for free.” “I knew I was in the wrong profession,” another commented. WATCH: Bear Steals Chick-fil-A Off Family’s Porch.
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