A generation ago, bears and other wild animals were seldom seen in populated areas. Now, say experts, encounters between citizens and wildlife are as common on residential cul-de-sacs as in parks like Yellowstone. In New Jersey, officials scheduled the first bear hunt in more than 30 years last December despite protests from animal rights activists. In Florida, where alligators bit humans only five times during the 1950s, about 18 people a year are attacked by the reptiles these days--including 12-year-old Malcolm Locke, who lost a chunk of his left ear on May 19 while swimming in a lake in the Orlando 'burbs. Across the West a spate of mountain lion attacks has joggers avoiding suburban parks, while in Beverly Hills, Ozzy Osbourne is only one of countless residents who have lost a dog to coyotes. Even in the densest redoubts of American civilization, it seems, homeowners are fighting losing battles against growing populations of deer, beavers and Canada geese. According to John Hadidian, director of the urban wildlife protection program of the Humane Society of the United States in Washington, D.C., "Animals are adjusting to human habitats." Odocoileus virginianus--better known as the white-tailed deer--is a case in point. After disappearing from much of its habitat by the beginning of the 1900s, they are soaring in number because of a determined effort by conservationists. Nothing, says Michael Conover, has helped spike the population like suburban sprawl: "They like lawns. They like bushes. Now we have many more deer than the Puritans saw."