This week, passersby near Dostyk Plaza, a popular shopping center in Almaty that is busy nearly all the time, spotted a wild fox.
A video posted on social media shows the fox standing fearlessly near a group of men before running away when one of them started walking toward it. The animal did not appear aggressive. In the comments, people speculated about how it had ended up in such a busy part of the city.
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Some users suggested that deforestation and development around the Kok-Zhailau Plateau and Butakovka Gorge could be forcing wild animals to descend from the mountains into the city, even though the urban environment is far from their natural habitat.
«It’s just like in the ‘Yellowstone’ TV series, when animals started coming down to town because of construction in the mountains. We’ve already seen a snow leopard and a fox; now we’re waiting for a bear,» one commenter wrote under the video.
Similar encounters between wildlife and people have become increasingly common elsewhere. In Japan, home to populations of Asiatic black bears and brown bears, human development has increased contact between people and wildlife. In some cases, bear encounters have resulted in injuries and deaths. In response, Japanese authorities have expanded measures to control problem bears and protect communities.
In California, whose state flag famously features a bear, encounters with wild animals are also not uncommon. In one recent incident caught on camera, a family of bears wandered into the yard of Los Angeles-area residents and took a dip in their pool during the hot summer.
According to wildlife specialists, bears, raccoons, coyotes, foxes and even leopards are increasingly venturing into urban areas around the world because of factors including human expansion, the availability of food waste and climate change. With these factors unlikely to disappear anytime soon, encounters between people and wildlife could become increasingly common.
