🔗 Share this article

Wildlife officers in BC are still their search for a female grizzly bear and her two cubs, four days after the adult bear attacked a party of schoolchildren and their instructors in an “highly unusual” encounter that has rattled the remote Canadian town.

Details of the Incident

Eleven people, including as young as age nine, sustained injuries on Thursday when the bear emerged from the woods near Four Mile, a Nuxalk settlement near the town of the Bella Coola area, and attacked a group of students on a lunch break alongside a walking trail.

Three teachers battled the grizzly off: one discharged two canisters of pepper spray that appeared to have little effect, another jumped on the animal, pummeling it with punches. A final struck the grizzly repeatedly with her walking aids before it finally retreated back into the forest.

Consequences and Reaction

3 children were taken to a medical center after the incident, among them a pair with serious injuries. An adult was also flown to a facility in Vancouver. 7 additional individuals were treated in the local area.

The region’s minister of environment, Tamara Davidson stated the instructors “took great risk” when they stepped in to defend the kids. “They had been properly equipped, and they were the true heroes.”

Conservation experts say that considering the size of the group, the assault was largely unprecedented in the region. But it has caused concern throughout the community, and put the outdoors-oriented residents on restricted movement as officers search for the aggressive animal.

Hunt for the Bear

During the past few days, the area’s conservation service said it had scoured a extensive, cordoned off area of the Bella Coola river valley for the female bear and her two cubs, but the rocky and densely forested terrain has offered up limited evidence.

“This is, speaking from experience, probably the riskiest task that wildlife officials do, especially dealing with family units with female bears,” Sgt. Jeff Tyre of the Conservation Officer Service said at a news conference on Sunday.

Whenever feasible, teams will live-trap grizzlies and gather DNA samples to confirm the probable attackers. But, as the sergeant said: “The bears do not always cooperate.”

The searchers, operating amid freezing temperatures and under threat of winter weather, are also racing against the natural cycles of grizzlies, who will soon start winter sleep as the severe cold arrives.

Broader Context

Grizzly bears have coexisted with the Nuxalk nation for ages. But the area, dubbed the “gateway to the Great Bear forest” in tourism campaigns, has experienced rising numbers of grizzly bears in recent years that residents say has upset a delicate balance. Community leaders say not only human action, such as logging, and the impacts of global warming, like wildfires and droughts, have disrupted key sources of nourishment and displaced the animals.

Residents have noted seeing bears more frequently in their yards and experienced occasional break-ins.

A resident, who resides with her husband in the Bella Coola valley, told a news outlet that she returned home recently to find their front door smashed in. Inside their house, the cooking area was wrecked and their refrigerator had been pulled to the garden. A steel trailer in their property was also demolished.

“[The bears had ripped off, and folded in half, the metal entrance and entered and just destroyed that,” she explained. “They wrecked the heater. We had just had it filled up with fuel. And it was all lost… and simply all was smashed,” she added.

Controversial Discussions

The BCWF warned that Thursday’s attack, which conservation officers described “atypical”, reflects a larger trend in the province. The group, which supports sportsmen, claimed a decision to prohibit trophy hunting of brown bears in 2017 – a action the group said was made “due to popular opinion, with without scientific rationale” – was partly to blame.

“Over a decade preceding the ban, reports to the [conservation officers] concerning grizzly conflicts ranged from several hundred a year, peaking between April and November,” the group reported. “Since the restriction, complaints about grizzly bears increased twofold, to nearly 1,000 a year.” But the organization’s call to restart the trophy hunt has caused divisions in the hunting circles, reflecting the controversial aspect of the hunt.

“The notion of killing to manage bears, it’s an old way of thinking that we really need to change and review. And Indigenous groups, like the Nuxalk nation have demonstrated there is a distinct approach. They do not regulate animals because it’s not something to manage. They’re guardians,” said a spokesperson, director of the charitable bear conservation group.

Numerous of the more remote Indigenous communities in the area have bear education programs that embody a more holistic way of interacting with grizzlies.

“As we observe a change in food sources and blazes, things are changing. The animals are traveling and roaming in new patterns. And so we need to think in new ways than how we have for generations in this province,” said Scapillati.

“Indigenous groups have been pioneers in this area. And so not just do they need support for us now in this period with this uncommon attack, but they additionally need help on the strategies they’ve shown the public are needed to accomplish what they’ve long known is possible: peaceful living with grizzlies.”