A four and a half year old female grizzly was struck and killed by a train last Thursday west of Banff.
Bear 109, the offspring of the well-known Banff Bear 64, was struck on the tracks near the Fireside day use area at the junction of the Trans-Canada Highway and Bow Valley Parkway.
Parks Canada human-wildlife conflict specialist Steve Michel said the female grizzly wasn't killed instantly but made it a short distance away from the railway across the parkway and died under a spruce tree.
It was all internal injures," Michel said. "She had a badly broken rear leg and I suspect massive internal trauma."
No grain was present on the track, nor was any found in the scat near the site.
"I suspect she was just feeding on green vegetation near the railway tracks," Michel said.
It's unknown why Bear 109 was walking along the tracks, but the area is a tight pinch point in the valley, and wildlife will sometimes use it as a travelling corridor.
The area has been known to be dangerous to bears though. Bear 109's death is the fifth within a half a mile stretch since 2007.
"Unfortunately it's somewhat of a predictable location where we can have fatalities," Michel said. "We're obviously very upset we did lose another grizzly bear."
Canadian Pacific Railway has instituted a whistle requirement for that section of the tracks, meaning crews must sound the whistle every time they pass through that stretch regardless if they see wildlife or not.
CPR spokesperson Breanne Feigel said it's one of the ways the company is trying to reduce the number of bears that are killed each year on the tracks. She said crews are "hyper sensitive and aware of the area" but "there is no hard and clean solution."
Putting up fences in the area wouldn't work, she said, because the location is a pinch point, and could result in animals being trapped between fences.
"The CPR and all stakeholders have not found the golden key solution to wildlife interaction," she said, noting they've taken many mitigating steps. "We do what we can on an incremental basis."
One step is the project they've undertaken to fix leaky grain hopper cars, which has been fast tracked and is scheduled to be done this year.
The loss of Bear 109 is a blow to the local grizzly bear community. The young grizzly's mother, Bear 64, who is now 21 years old, is well known for living just on the outskirts of town, but never creating issues with people. Last year, Bear 64 and Bear 109, along with her sibling Bear 108, hunted elk in Fenland Trail, and a temporary closure was set up to allow them to feed, but no conflicts with people were ever reported.
Michel said they were saddened by the death of a female bear that could have produced more cubs, but were somewhat relieved it wasn't Bear 64, who has had many cubs over the years. While she had no cubs this year, she is still of reproductive age.
Since 2000, Bear 109 is the 11th grizzly bear that has been killed in the Bow Valley on the train tracks.
