Efforts continue to find the bear that attacked a school group near Bella Coola, British Columbia, last Thursday. What will happen next is still in question.
Encounters with bears are not uncommon in Canada, especially in British Columbia pricesTrawl Coast. However, attacks like last week's, involving large groups, are just that, according to conservation experts CBC News spoke to.
But there is still debate and debate about what could or should happen to the bears if they are found and ultimately implicated in the incident.
How do they find the bear?
British Columbia is home to about 13,000 grizzly bears, many of them in the Central Coast region.
Territory nearby 4 mile division in traditional territories The state of Nuxalk, where last Thursday's attack occurred, has a fairly high bear population – about 22 bears per 1,000 square kilometers. according to provincial estimates.
British Columbia conservation teams track where bears are moving, place baits in expected locations and set traps.
Once the bear is captured and subdued, officers match the animal with witness statements and evidence collected at the scene of the attack, including tracks, hair or anything else the bear may have bitten during the attack.g incident.
“Even furtherr, the bears left forensic marks on the victims’ clothing,” Kevy said.n Van Damme, an inspector with the British Columbia Conservation Service (BCCOS). “From there…we'll do some lab work to make sure we have the right bear.”
What could have provoked the attack?
According to grizzly bear experts, the larger the size of the group of people, the less likely it is that a bear will attack.
Brian Falconer of BC's Rain Coast Conservation Foundation says that, to his knowledge, there has never been a grizzly bear attack on a group of more than six people.
“This is not uncommon,” he said of the Bella Coola attack, which involved at least 20 people. “It's unique.”
He says we may never know what caused the bear to attack. He says bears have different personalities and comfort levels in terms of personal space.
“It depends on whether you're protecting the cubs. If you just fought another male to protect your cubs, you're on high alert.”
Authorities have not indicated whether any of the attacked group fled, as experts say. may also increase the bear's reaction.
According to a BCCOS statement last Friday: “Several teachers physically intervened using bear spray and bear shaking to drive the bear away.”
“Fortunately, the teachers were prepared,” Van Damme said at a briefing later that day. “They did everything they were supposed to do and avoided serious injury to others.”
Sergeant Jeff Tire of the BC Conservation Service says information officials have received “probably involved a sow and two cubs in the attack on a school group in Bella Coola.” He added that the bears have not yet been caught.
What happens when the grizzlies are found?
Van Damme is yoursA variety of professionals will work together to determine next steps after the bears are discovered, including a provincial wildlife veterinarian, a large carnivore specialist and a wildlife biologist.
“A big part of it will be assessing the bear,” he said in an interview with CBC's Ian Hanomansing on Monday.
This could potentially help determine “why this bear did something that we just don't see in the bear's behavior,” Van Damme said. “We won't know any results until we do more analysis.”
Falconer expects the community where the students and faculty who carried out the attack were from will be consulted.
The Nuxalk people have coexisted with bears for thousands of years and may not believe the best solution is to simply kill the offending bear, he said.
Three students and one teacher were hospitalized Thursday when a bear attacked a group of about 20 people in Bella Coola, a community about 420 kilometers northwest of Vancouver. Bella Coola Valley resident Tanisse Munroe says she and other residents are scared by the dangers grizzly bears pose.
Until the bear is finally identified and the circumstances of the attack become clearer, it is impossible to say whether the bears will be relocated or euthanized.
Falconer says that most often when a bear is injured, it is euthanized.
If this mother with cubs, experts say the age of the cubs will also likely be part of the assessment and could influence the decision.
How does the move happen?
If the decision is made to relocate the bear, this can be done in two ways.
Relocations are most often done to “buy time” so people can remove whatever is attracting bears to the area, says Lana Ciarniello, an independent environmental scientist and co-chair of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) expert group on human-bear conflict.
For example, if someone has trash, live chickens, or even fruit trees in their yard, this could attract bears. Capturing the animals and moving them 10 to 20 kilometers gives people the opportunity to install bear-resistant trash cans or electric fencing.
“We want to give the bear a chance and some time because this is a human problem that the bear is preying on.”
The bear will likely return, but if it doesn't find food, it will likely leave, Ciarniello said.
Translocation means moving bears a long distance from the site of an attack in order to prevent their return. This can mean moving the bear hundreds or even thousands of kilometers, sometimes even across a mountain range.
But, according to Ciarniello, this is not always a guarantee that the bear will not return.
“There's a male, a big male, that was transported from southwest British Columbia many years ago, decades ago, and they tracked his return. They transported him thousands of kilometers and he came back.”
Ciarniello says it's trueInstead of relocating and relocating bears, it would be better to “start addressing the root cause of all these conflicts.”
She says this means better management of non-natural foods and items. like trash and unguarded chicken coops.
Is the attack related to the end of trophy hunting?
Since the attack there have been calls for resumption of trophy hunting of grizzly bears in British Columbiawhich The provincial government ceased to exist in 2017. Only Indigenous peoples are permitted to kill grizzly bears under Indigenous rights for food, social or ceremonial purposes.
The British Columbia Wildlife Federation, which is advocating for hunting to resume, sayswithout it, “The number of problem grizzlies is increasing“
Falconer disagrees, saying that killing hundreds of bears because of the actions of one would not make anyone safer.
“Opening trophy hunting and killing 350 bears a year across the province in retaliation is not the answer.”
Ciarniello also notes that the bear involved in the recent attack may have been a female with cubs.
“Females with cubs were never allowed to be hunted,” she said. “So these bears would not be removed from the population.”
Asked Monday if the government was considering reintroducing trophy hunting, British Columbia Environment Minister Tamara Davidson said that even when hunting was open, it was not typically conducted in areas where attacks had occurred.
“So this may not be the solution,” she said. “The solution now is to find the bear.”
