LH, I'm surprised you've had only one bear encounter! I've had so many I can't count 'em - from the ones who'd raid my campsite in Algonquin Park to the young black bear who wandered into the churchyard across the street from my house a few years ago. He'd drawn a small crowd of onlookers, standing well back at a safe distance of course -until the police arrived and shooed us away.

Then they shot him.

That was very upsetting. A couple weeks before a tiger had escaped from an exotic animals compound near here. Thousands and thousands of dollars were spent to hire a helicopter and buy tranquilizer darts to recapture the tiger - but the bear was only worth a couple 50 cent bullets. :-( And his crime? Encroaching on human territory.

BUt here's my favorite bear story. The last time I drove through Banff National Park in May 2002, there was an outcry going on in Canmore (just outside the park). Apparently our gov't had spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to trap and fit the local grizzlies (an endangered species) with radio collars, even though such interference is highly traumatic and sometimes fatal for the bears.

Why the concern over the grizzlies? Because the G8 summit people were meeting in Lake Louise that spring, and wanted the terrorist bears
monitored so they could enjoy the park without fear. The aim is to catch as many bears as possible in the 2,500 sq mile Kananaskis wilderness in which the summit will be held. The bears will then be fitted with radio collars that will allow wildlife experts to monitor their movements and warn security officers if a grizzly is approaching any of the world leaders tucked up inside their luxury holiday lodges.

Personally, I think the planet would have been much better off if the G8 summit people had been caught and collared, and the bears given minute-by-minute information about their whereabouts.


daylia