Fish and Wildlife officials have set up traps to try and capture a grizzly bear that has surprised at least two people on the trails in Griffith Woods Park.
The area has been closed to visitors and signs have been posted at the entrance to the park, which borders the south edge of Discovery Ridge.
Officers say bear activity has been high in the area over the past week.
"We had a report last week, maybe Wednesday and a couple of sightings, never more than that." Trevor Miller, superintendent with Alberta Fish and Wildlife said. "On Saturday we had residents close by where the bear was attracted to a fruit tree."
The bear was spotted by a cyclist and then by a jogger. Officials say the cyclist managed to startle the bear, causing it run off, and that the jogger, Tresa Gibson. came within metres of the animal before running away.
Gibson says she was running with her dog Ellie on the morning of September 20 on the park's Woodchip Pass when there was a rustle in the bushes ahead of them. Gibson assumed it was a coyote or a deer in the brush until Ellie let out several warning barks.
“I caught up to her, I was a bit behind her, and then I turned and looked into the bush," recalled Gibson. "About six to eight feet away from me, close enough that if I took a couple of steps I could have touched it, was a bear standing there. He was chewing on some berries and some branches.”
"I said ‘come’ to my dog and I turned and I got out of there real quick.”
Gibson said the bear seemed uninterested in her and her dog and the animal did not give chase as she ran away. The encounter has changed Gibson's approach to jogging in the park.
“I have been running through here for ten years, every single day,” said Gibson. “I won’t ever go in without bear spray again. I am nervous. It was the first time ever where I was in a situation where I felt threatened. Sometimes friends have been nervous to run with me and I’ve never really understood. The trail’s always seemed safe to me, it’s like my home.”
There have been no reports of the bear attacking anyone but officials are concerned it may have become habituated to humans.
"We have the area closed and we have some traps set," explained Miller. "We'll leave them for a couple days. We'll set some cameras on the trailheads to see if the bear will come back to the trap. If he's not gone in, we'll probably have to reevaluate after a couple days."
Deannie Simes, who walks her dogs in the area on a regular basis, says she keeps a simple strategy in mind. "I always try and make noise because I don't want to run into anything, There's a moose that lives here too and a lot of coyotes."
The 93 hectare park is bordered by the Elbow River and dense forest and a number of wildlife encounters have been reported by area residents over the years.
