Shaking its massive body, the bear that had just woken from hibernation walked slowly. The hungry bear was munching on its food. The It! reporting team headed to Bear Mountain in Shintoku Town, Hokkaido.
At this facility, which raises brown bears in an environment close to nature, the 11 bears hibernated quietly throughout the winter. In the cage that the director peered into was a bear that had just woken from hibernation in March. It was eating food it had grasped with its sharp claws.
Bear Mountain Director Masaru Sakaide: This year, we didn’t feed them for 88 days, and the other bears reacted to the smell of food and woke up all at once. The bears, which had accumulated fat before hibernation and weighed 420 kg, lost about 60 kg after fasting during hibernation.
Looking at the bear’s stomach, you can see that its ribs are sticking out and it is quite thin. The bears’ diet after hibernation consists of a high-calorie, high-protein feed. The goal is to gradually fatten them up while they regain their physical condition. Inside the enclosure, the sound of the newly hibernating bears banging on the door echoed. What could this mean…?
Masaru Sakaide, Director of Bear Mountain: They want the door opened quickly and food… Their reaction to food is incredible. When you show them the food, they rush towards the enclosure and get excited, as if to say, “Give me food!” Bear attacks have become a serious problem across Japan in 2025. This year, there have already been numerous sightings of “spring bears” that have woken up from hibernation. In Furano City, Hokkaido, there have been three bear sightings in the last week alone. On the night of March 24th, a bear jumped out of a field and collided with a car driving on a national highway.
The car was rendered inoperable, but the driver was unharmed. While residents are feeling uneasy about the bears’ appearances, “bear repellent goods” are already on display at local home improvement stores. Starting in 2025, they doubled the size of their sales floor and stocked a wide variety of bear products, including bear bells and bear repellent sprays. DCM Furano store’s deputy manager, Miyashita Futoshi, said, “It’s a very early start. (Normally) we don’t start stocking up from early March. We get a lot of inquiries because we think the period before and after hibernation is the most dangerous.” Amid a series of spring bear sightings, Katsuo Harada, a veteran hunter with 55 years of experience, has started patrolling in Iwamizawa City, Hokkaido.
Katsuo Harada (85), with 55 years of hunting experience: “I think bears will start appearing here and there soon. If it rains, they’ll all come out at once. They say that if the snow melts with the rain, the bears that are in their dens will come down from the mountains.” About 25 years ago, Harada lost his left eye in a bear attack while deer hunting, and since then he has been protecting the safety of the community in order to eliminate bear attacks. It was near a box trap that Harada had set up during his patrol that he sensed something unusual. Suddenly, he began sniffing the area.
Katsuo Harada, a hunter with 55 years of experience: “I smell something, I smell a bear. Here it comes, it’s coming!” Harada, who captured 19 bears in 2025, said about bears emerging from hibernation, “The reality is that there is a shortage of food. It’s a very tough time for bears. They’re hungry and will eat anything. Even if they think it’s a little dangerous, that’s where they’ll go (into the box trap).” “Spring bears” are appearing in various places. In 2025, bears that have eaten in urban areas may develop a taste for it and reappear in the same place, so caution is necessary.
Bears have been sighted for three consecutive days after emerging from hibernation. Following a large number of sightings last year, bears are on the rise this spring. The Minister of the Environment has issued a warning.
■Beware of excited “fasting bears” Spring is when bears awaken from hibernation. Sightings have already been reported in various locations. In Ishikawa Prefecture, bears that have emerged from hibernation have been confirmed for three consecutive days up to the 30th.
Katsuyuki Nakata of the Ishikawa Prefecture Bunaoyama Observation Center: “A bear was confirmed at the facility that observes Bunaoyama, which is 500 meters away on the opposite bank. We confirmed that the bear was moving slowly.” Is it looking for food? It is sniffing the mountain slope.
Katsuyuki Nakata of the Bunaoyama Observation Center in Ishikawa Prefecture said, “They are moving slowly on the ground. We have seen them climbing nearby trees and eating thistles, dogtooth violets, and leaves that appear to be plants growing on the ground. I think they are hungry. However, since they have just come out of hibernation, they probably seem a bit sluggish. After moving around, we have also seen them sleeping for a while.” The bears have emerged from their dens after a long winter. With the arrival of spring, they are beginning to become active in areas close to human settlements. On the 31st, Environment Minister Ishihara urged the public to be extremely careful of “bears that have come out of hibernation.”
Environment Minister Hirotaka Ishihara said, “There have already been numerous sightings of bears in various places. It is expected that bears that have woken up from hibernation will start to appear in the coming days. In particular, when there was a large number of bear sightings in the fall of 2023, there was a tendency for sightings to increase in the spring of the following year.” Last fall, bears were also sighted one after another in urban areas and human settlements. This means that there is a tendency for sightings to increase this spring as well. On the 29th, there were sightings of what appeared to be a mother and cub bear in the Kanto region.
In Nasushiobara City, Tochigi Prefecture, three bears were spotted on a road facing a park with a retention pond. What do bears actually do after waking up from hibernation? On the 31st, the J Channel reporting team visited a facility that keeps brown bears. They opened a sturdy door and went inside. Beyond another double door was an iron-barred enclosure. Masaru Sakaide, director of Bear Mountain: “This is Mitt. He’s the biggest bear we have. He weighs 360 kilograms. Before hibernation, he weighed over 400 kilograms.” Bear Mountain in Hokkaido keeps 11 brown bears. For about three months from December last year, the brown bears hibernated in this enclosure. This is footage of them waking up during hibernation and loosening their straw. Masaru Sakaide, director of Bear Mountain: “They’re knocking on the door asking for food.” They say the bears are begging for food from inside the cage. They stand up and look around.
Masaru Sakaide, director of Bear Mountain, said, “Many of the bears started banging and shaking the door as soon as they smelled the food, showing they wanted it quickly.” He added that they were “starving” because they hadn’t eaten anything for three months. Masaru Sakaide said, “They were in an excited state. Seeing that, it’s scary to think what would happen if a wild bear approached in that excited state.” He said that bears lose an average of 60 kilograms during hibernation.
Masaru Sakaide added, “Wild bears are also desperate to eat after coming out of hibernation.” He warned that bears that appeared in urban areas last year may return to populated areas in the spring in search of food. Masaru Sakaide said, “Bears that have been in urban areas before may be likely to come out in the spring. You have to be careful not to leave out food waste at night, as this can attract bears.” He urged people to take measures to keep bears away now that spring has arrived. [TV Asahi NEWS]
