Revelstoke is proud of its bears. There are statues of them at the entrance to town. But, so far this summer, 10 of the animals have been killed there; nine in just the last week.
“We celebrate bears,” said Catherine Moore, who witnessed one of the bear shootings. “Right now we’re not celebrating them, we’re killing them.”
Moore says she’s still traumatized after watching a conservation officer put a bear down.
“Blood was everywhere… there were people all over the place, and kids were screaming on the street,” she said.
The man pulling the trigger is conservation officer Dan Bartol and he’s not happy about it.
“I think everybody should be upset. I’m upset. Conservation Officer Service is upset. If we didn’t create this situation, I wouldn’t have to be dealing with it in this manner,” said Bartol.
Bears have broken into sheds, garages and homes in the community. One bear, that’s still on the loose, broke into Abbi Reynold’s house three times. She says in one instance, she was so close she could have touched the animal.
The reason the bears are making their way into town is man-made and entirely preventable, says Bartol. The bears are finding attractants – unsecured garbage and fruit on the trees – all around the town.
“People should be securing their attractants by whatever means is necessary,” said Bartol. “People can take it upon themselves to secure their garbage, to pick their fruit – even if it means picking it a little bit early before it’s ripe, that’s just unfortunate. If we want to keep bears safe, we’ve got to get rid of all the attractants.”
The black bears have become so habituated that last week one walked along a downtown street and right into a clothing store. It was shot a few blocks away.
“I think it’s horrible,” said resident Cassie Vansickle. “I think that there should be no reason why we can’t relocate them and do something different than kill them.”
“It becomes a danger. It becomes habituated, it becomes less afraid of humans and vehicles and homes and dogs and other things like that and it presents a real, clear threat to people,” said Kyle Brosseuk, another Revelstoke resident.
Revelstoke isn’t alone in their bear challenge: several incidents made headlines around Metro Vancouver in the last week as well.
Earlier this month, a 10-year-old girl was attacked by a black bear in Coquitlam, suffering serious injuries including a punctured lung.
Conservation officers discovered two bears at the scene, a female black bear with a cub. The mother bear was destroyed, and the cub was tranquilized.
Last week, a man out on his morning run in the North Shore’s Capilano River Regional Park encountered a black bear on the busy trail, sitting on its haunches.
He was followed by the bear for several kilometres, and at times it came so close to him it touched him with its snout. At one point Lubell fell, scraping his arms and legs, but managed to escape otherwise uninjured.
Conservation officers say garbage played a role in attracting the bears in both cases.
Bartol says he doesn’t enjoy this part of his job. “Protecting the wildlife is really my motivation for getting into this job but public safety, human safety has to trump that at the expense of the bears unfortunately.”
He estimates there are at least three possibly six more habituated bears in the area. He's setting out traps to catch them; all of the bears caught will be destroyed.
“I’d much prefer to deal with it proactively,” says Bartol.
With files from Kevin Green and CTV Vancouver
