MCMILLAN TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP) — An Upper Peninsula bear ranch is expanding through a state forest land exchange.

The Mining Journal of Marquette reports Friday that the Michigan Department of Natural Resources this week approved a deal to exchange land plots of about 160 acres with Oswald's Bear Ranch near Newberry in McMillan Township.

Owner Dean Oswald says the transaction was in the works for a couple years. The DNR-provided land is adjacent to the private ranch and the department will receive a parcel a few miles east off M-123.

The DNR says the land it's acquiring will connect property it owns to the north and south, and it features a high degree of species diversity.

The ranch claims to be the largest of its kind in the U.S. with 29 roaming black bears.

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Information from: The Mining Journal, www.miningjournal.net