Are there bears in Aspen, Colorado?

Yes. Black bears are active in and around Aspen between late April and early November, and in autumn they regularly come into the downtown core looking for food. There are no grizzly bears in Colorado.

What should I do if I see a bear in Aspen?

Keep your distance, do not approach it for a photograph, and give it a clear escape route. Report the sighting to the City of Aspen on 970-920-BEAR or at bears@aspen.gov. Approaching or harassing a bear can be fined.

Why are there bears in downtown Aspen in the autumn?

Before hibernation bears eat almost constantly, and an unsecured bin in an alley is far less work than a hillside of berries. Aspen requires wildlife-resistant containers for this reason, with fines of $250, $500 and $1,000 for repeat violations.

Bears in Aspen: Why They Come Downtown in Autumn

A black bear in a spruce tree above a pedestrian street in central Aspen — Downtown Aspen, September · filmed from across the mall

Shop windows, flower beds, a spruce tree on the mall — and thirty feet up it, a black bear having a long think about its afternoon. Visitors find this astonishing. Locals check whether their bin is latched.

Why they come into town

Black bears are active around Aspen from late April to early November. The autumn weeks are the intense ones: before hibernation a bear eats almost continuously, and it is doing arithmetic the whole time. A hillside of berries is a day's work. An unlatched bin behind a restaurant is four thousand calories and takes ninety seconds.

So they come down. Not because the town is wild, but because the town is easy. A bear that finds one unsecured bin will come back, bring its cubs, and stop being afraid of people — and a bear that stops being afraid of people usually ends up dead. That is the part visitors do not see.

The rules — and they are enforced

Aspen requires wildlife-resistant, latched containers. It is written into the city's municipal code, and the fines escalate:

$250 for a first violation
$500 for a second
$1,000 for each one after that

If you are renting a house here, the bin is your responsibility while you have it.

What to do if you meet one

Colorado has no grizzlies. Every bear you will see here is a black bear, and a black bear in a tree in town is a frightened animal waiting for the crowd to leave, not a threat looking for one.

Keep your distance and keep moving. Do not put yourself between a bear and the direction it wants to go, and never between a mother and cubs. If you are with a dog, leash it. If you are eating outside, take your plate in.

Do not approach it for a photograph

This is not advice, it is the law. Aspen has issued a $250 fine for bear harassment to a resident who got too close. A long lens or a phone from across the street is fine. Walking up to it is an offence, and it is also how a bear learns that people can be pushed past.

Report a bear in town to the City of Aspen: 970-920-BEAR or bears@aspen.gov.

The season this belongs to

If you are here in late September or October you are in the overlap: the aspens are turning, the town is quiet, and the bears are in their last hard weeks before the snow. All three are the same event seen from different angles.

Our guide to the fall colors covers where and when the valley turns gold. For what the town is actually like in this stretch — what is open, what has closed, what it costs — see when to visit Aspen. And if you are eating out, the restaurant guide is at its most available right now.