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All Attractants Articles
Two more black bears were destroyed in Whistler in recent days, and conservation officers are keeping busy with a number of bears frequenting the Village.
A poor and late berry crop in the alpine is keeping bears in the valley looking for food.
"It's been extremely busy in Whistler," Sgt. Dave Jevons from the B.C. Conservation Officer Service said of black bear activity and conflict this week.
This Shuswap resident is smarter than the average bear.Ken Oakes snapped this photo of a black bear using a ladder in an attempt to get at a bird feeder in Anstey Arm on Monday, August 22.
"The bear almost got to the bird feeder but the ladder tipped over as he started to climb. It looked as though he was going to attempt to stand it up again but gave up," says Oakes.
He says there are plenty of bears searching for available snacks, likely due to the late berry season. You may also want to keep a close eye on your picnic baskets.
Relying on "black gold" to nourish their Greater Trail gardens has led a couple of friends to creating bear-proof composters.
Now, after solving their own critter problems, a team of gardeners swears by their smell-resistant composters that not only look attractive in their backyard but also keep the bears away.
A surge of problem bears on the North Shore is causing headaches for conservation officers, as a poor berry crop has driven the animals into populated areas.
So far, eight bears have been killed on the North Shore, compared to 10 last year and one the year before.
Conservation officers and RCMP have been called to three instances where bears have entered people's houses, including one on Tuesday on Brockton Crescent in North Vancouver where a woman was trapped inside the home as the bear rummaged through the kitchen.
GULL LAKE -- Cottagers in bear country have plenty of anecdotal evidence to support the controversial theory that feeding black bears can keep them away from populated areas.
At this cottage development southeast of Grand Beach, Helen Toews and her neighbour, Alice Nixdorf, said bears regularly walk through their development at least twice day -- early morning and late afternoon.
But Nixdorf said bears weren't a problem here until officials closed the local dump.
WINNIPEG - A wildlife biologist from Minnesota says black bear problems this summer can be solved without killing any more bears.
Lynn Rogers, director of the Wildlife Research Institute and the North American Bear Centre in Ely, Minnesota, said studies show that putting food out for bears at a designated site - a practice known as diversionary feeding - can keep black bears away from populated areas but doesn't condition the bears to human food.
Manitoba Conservation is defending a decision to kill a black bear that wandered near the popular shoreline at Grand Beach Provincial Park on Thursday.
Conservation spokesman Robert Belanger said there were so many people on the beach at the time, the only option was to kill the animal.
Conservation officers shot another bear in Whistler this week after the animal entered several homes in the Whistler Cay neighbourhood.
The incident brings the total of black bears killed so far this year because of conflict with humans to six. And with a poor berry crop so far this summer, conflict activity is expected to continue in the valley, said Sgt. Chris Doyle of the Conservation Officer Service.
Some of the world's foremost bear experts are to gather in Banff next month to find new ways to prevent grizzlies from getting killed along railway tracks inside the national park.
A dozen of the bears have been killed and a half dozen cubs orphaned in the last decade and experts estimate there are now only between 45 and 60 grizzlies left in the park. Last year, Alberta reclassified the species as threatened because of rapidly dwindling numbers.
Three of the mighty bruins have died this year. Two were killed on the Trans-Canada Highway. A third was hit by a train on the CP Rail line and left behind two orphan cubs.
Bear attacks are rare but it's best to be safe, says Dan LeGrandeur, who develops bear conflict management plans and teaches bear aversion techniques to emergency personnel and resource workers in B.C. and Alberta.
"Unless you have a lot of interactions with bears, there's all sorts of pre-conceived ideas that they are man-eaters, which is not true," said LeGrandeur, a former B.C. Conservation Officer who used to work in the Tri-Cities and now lives in Alberta and operates Bear Scare.
Black bears are undeniably a part of the Whistler scene and are beloved by locals and tourists alike. Unfortunately, they're also the source of frustration for some, most notably the conservation officers who are forced to deal with the animals when the get into conflict with humans.
Most of the time these conflicts are not the fault of the animal but rather people who were careless in how they went about securing potential bear attractants such as garbage and bird feeders.
Strawberry Point, a popular camping area north of Pemberton, will remain closed for the long weekend if a troublesome black bear has not been captured or moved on in time, conservation officers said this week.
“We’ve had a bear there that’s been extremely aggressive and approached campers for food,” Sgt. Chris Doyle of the Conservation Officer Service, said Wednesday (July 27). “It’s totally lost its fear of people and has received food rewards from campsites and has repeatedly approached people for food and tried to chase people out of their sites in order to look for food.
Lana Hollingsworth, 61, died late on Monday at a Scottsdale hospital of complications from the injuries she received when the bear attacked her in Pinetop, in northeast Arizona, her husband Marv Hollingsworth said.
"She was a real animal lover, so it's strange that she was killed by bear," Hollingsworth told Reuters. "But that's the way life can be, I guess."
BOZEMAN, Mont. - An adult female grizzly bear in the West Yellowstone, Mont., area had to be killed this week due to concerns for human safety.
According to bear managers, the grizzly's habituation towards people, human food rewards and the lack of remote relocation sites led to an inter-agency decision to remove the bear.
A conservation officer shot and killed a black bear after it made its way into a Lynn Valley resident's backyard Thursday evening and tried to get into the house.
The animal had come on to the property near east 15th street and Eastview repeatedly over the course of two days, according to the B.C. Conservation Officer Service. The owner hadn't reported it on the first day, but when it kept coming back, had decided to contact the service. When officers arrived, he showed them pictures of the bear, a juvenile male, trying aggressively to enter his home.
Chicken coop raids by local black bears are on the rise, just as Southcentral moves into its peak season for bear activity, according to an Anchorage biologist.
In July alone, at least five black bears caught pilfering poultry have been shot, either by homeowners or police, said Anchorage area Fish and Game biologist Jessy Coltrane, who said she suspects more bear kills go unreported.
"Chickens are one of our biggest attractants, aside from garbage and bird seed, and it's growing because the number of chickens is growing," Coltrane said.
Two North Shore black bears were killed in separate incidents on Wednesday, the community's first bear deaths of the year.
One of the bears was destroyed on Seymour Mountain after a close encounter with a jogger around noon.
Scott Smith had been running along a trail near the Mushroom parking lot, when he sensed he was being followed. He spotted a black bear and continued to run, prompting the bear to chase him, according to conservation officer Simon Gravel.
Alaska Wildlife Troopers recently cited a Juneau man they say has been illegally feeding dog food to as many as 15 black bears at his home.
Arnold W. Hanger, 66, is accused of spreading AttaBoy! dog food on rocks and logs around his property near Tee Harbor, north of Juneau, for years, troopers said. As a result, 10 to 15 bears had been hanging around the area and scaring neighbors, some of whom have small children, trooper Sgt. Matthew Dobson said.
Let's talk trash. Specifically, yours. What do you do with it? How do you get rid of it? Do you smuggle it on the bus to get it to the nearest dumpster you can find?
Maybe you work hard every day, sorting, cleaning and composting everything that can be diverted from the landfill (good job!). Do you stash it in your garage until it emits perfume de bear-come-'n'-get-me? Leave it sitting outside your recently built new-and-improved bear-proof garbage shed when you forget your key? At the bus stop partially stuffed into the already overflowing bin, essentially baiting a bear into your 'hood?
It has been a busy week or so for black bear activity and other wildlife in Whistler, with conservation officers making the decision to kill the first bear of the season because it entered a home in Alta Vista. Other recent bear-human encounters included two other home invasions, a bear raiding golf bags at a local course and a cub hit and killed by a vehicle on Highway 99.
A cougar sighting was also reported in Spring Creek last Wednesday (June 22).
It was a large, adult male black bear that conservation officers trapped and shot last Wednesday after it entered an Alta Vista home while two people were inside. The previous day (June 21), the bear went “deep into the house and into the kitchen” where it found food, said Chris Doyle, conservation officer.
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