There are lots of ways to get killed by predators in New Jersey. A bear in the woods, however, is not one that leaps to mind ....
and in New York state, a bear killed a 5-month-old girl in 2002 after knocking her out of a stroller and dragging her into the woods of the Catskills Mountains.
People are always talking about how the United States is overpopulated and too congested. But their only perspective is the large cities, the suburban sprawl and the ribbons of concrete that join them all together.
You have to get up in an airplane and look out the window to realize just how wide open this country still is.
I live in Fairfield County, which is the most densely populated county in the state of Connecticut - which itself is the 4th most densely populated state in the nation. Yet I'm surrounded with thousands of acres of forest. I can look into my back yard and observe deer, coyotes and all manners of wildlife. Sure, there are densely populated cities in my county, such as Danbury, Stamford and Bridgeport. But once you get away from the coast and drive the narrow hilly roads of smaller towns like Redding, Bethel, Weston and Easton, you'd think you were in the middle of Vermont.
This nation of ours could easily support ten billion people and still have plenty of open land. Though it would be nice if they all had jobs and supported themselves.
They never did catch the kidnap/rape/murderer on the Appalachian Trail.