Drones Overhead Make Bear Hearts Beat Faster

Apparently, bears aren't always as brave as they may seem.

When scientists watched American black bears as they flew drones nearby, the bears didn't seem bothered. However, when they strapped heart monitoring devices and GPS devices on them, the researchers saw dramatic heart rate spikes when drones — also known as unmanned aerial vehicles, or UAVs — flew by, they report in the journal Current Biology.

"Without the use of the biologger, we would have concluded that bears only occasionally respond to UAVs," lead study author Mark Ditmer of the University of Minnesota, St. Paul stated.