A Spring Bear Hunt Debate

A mama bear and her cubs are causing concern for some Schumacher residents

Liz White, Director of Animal Alliance says there is NO evidence that a spring bear hunt reduces the number of problem bears

She explains that there is no creditable scientific or factual information that the spring bear hunt has any kind of impact on the number of nuisance bears in the city. In fact, she says it’s more accurate to refer to The Spring Bear Hunt as “target practice” than to call it a sport.

While some say frequent bear sightings in the city are the reason why the Spring Bear Hunt is crucial, White disagrees – saying it’s more about understanding bear behaviour, rather than fearing it.

But Mayor Steve Black says, tackling the nuisance bear problem is easier said than done. He adds, he “always find it funny” when Animal Alliance groups speak up, yet most of them don’t live anywhere near Northern Ontario – hence, they don’t deal with the issues yet they “still feel the need to weigh in on the matter”. He says it would be very interesting to have these groups come to Timmins and try to remove the bears for us.

But White says, Animal Alliance has in fact seen positive results in the North, by implementing strategies to mitigate bear-human conflict. Specifically – she says, in Elliott Lake. White says by bringing concerns to council, the community was able to pass motions regarding how commercial garbage is handled. She says, in the course of doing that, they reduced the number of nuisance bears in Elliott Lake by “about half in a year”.

Mayor Steve Black says Timmins Bear Committee met once last week with another scheduled for next week, discussing what a lot of other municipalities are doing to remedy nuisance bear problems.

While Black says he is not a hunter himself, he does support bringing back the Spring Bear Hunt for many reasons – one being that bears just don’t seem as scared of humans anymore

Meanwhile, White says alleviating conflict with bears is simple, explaining what Animal Alliance recommends:

According to ontariospringbearhunt.ca, over 2/3 of all “nuisance bear” activity is related to garbage. AA Director Liz White says, if easy access to human garbage is stopped… the bears simply move on.

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She says, shooting bears in the spring, and even now – as some continue scavenging for food – is unethical because they it is so difficult for hunters to differentiate between a male and female bear. A mistake that could potentially, she says leave a dependent cub alone and starving to death.

She goes on to beg the question, why are the young of moose and deer protected but bears are thrown by the wayside?

She says there is proof that killing bears is not the answer. Because Animal Alliance’s goal is to try and mitigate human to wildlife conflicts, they have worked diligently with advocates – one in particular who spear heads the Bear-Wise Program in Elliott Lake.

Black says with the two year Spring Bear Hunt pilot project over, Northern Ontario communities should be pushing for the Spring Bear Hunt to return

Black says safety should be enough of a reason to want to see the return of the Spring Bear Hunt

But according to Animal Alliance on http://www.ontariospringbearhunt.ca/ there has “never been a black bear attack resulting in a fatality within a community anywhere in Canada. Of the few black bear attacks in North America over half have involved unleashed dogs.”

Another reason Black says he is fully supporting the return of the Spring Bear Hunt is because tourists are pumping millions of dollars into the local economy

A resolution is coming back to council next week, which looks as if it will pass.

Source: Live Science Photo with files from Ontario Spring Bear Hunt and Animal Alliance