A San Diego man was reported killed by a bear up in Denali Park/Alaska. Apparently he pushed his luck by getting too close in order to take a picture. As in similar types of incidents the animal is hunted down and killed. Why? It’s not as though the animal was doing anything but what comes natural in its own environment.
We are humans. No other creature gets to kill one of us and live. It’s tough, but you don’t get to be the top of the food chain by letting others slide.
Didn’t they kill the grizzly in Yellowstone earlier this year? Maybe a National Park Policy?
You let one bear get the idea that killing humans is a good idea and the next thing you know, we’re facing a horde of marauding bears. I for one do not welcome our ursine overlords.
Similarly, there was much back-and-forth on how to deal with mountain lions which were killing people, even though they were protected. The lions, that is.
Unfortunately, once bears lose their fear of humans they become more of a risk. There have been cases where they’ve let bears who have killed humans live but it’s pretty rare. The bear didn’t really do anything wrong, but it has been changed by this incident.
I don’t know as much about brown bears, but the “mankiller” myth actually is grounded in fact for black bears.
Black bears are naturally prey animals (they evolved during a time when large creatures like cave bears and etc roamed the world and they had to use climbing ability and etc to hide from predators) and are not really apex predators. Naturally, a black bear fears man and will avoid conflicts with man.
However for reasons wildlife biologists still do not really understand, very rarely black bears stalk and hunt humans against everything I just said. Notably the black bears that do this tend to do it repeatedly if given the chance and exhibit none of the natural fear of man.
Lynn Rogers is a wildlife biologist that has spent most of his life studying black bears, and had this to say on the topic:
(This is also why advice when attacked by a black bear is not to play dead, offensive attacks by black bears are rare but when they happen they are generally predatory.)
At least in Yellowstone, grizzlies who attack humans are not always put down. Usually when it’s the classic situation where the person gets between the bear and its cubs, they’ll chalk it up to bad luck. There was an incident just last year where a bear killed someone, but wasn’t culled because it was just protecting its cubs. But a lone grizzly should normally flee from humans, so even if the person was being colossally stupid in approaching the bear, it’s still a problem that the bear permitted the person to approach and attacked instead of fleeing.
You wouldn’t have to ask if you’d even eaten a human.
Also note that the wilderness management folks who end up with the job of killing the bear generally hate doing it, and blame the stupid human who got himself Darwinized for making it necessary.
The bear didn’t just kill him, he ate him. I would think that would make a difference on how the situation was handled.
made me wonder what a person is supposed to do if attacked by a bear.
I read about this today and the story had some comments from the Park superintendent about advice they give to park goers:
So a 1/4 mile is about 400 metres. Not having dealt with bears at all or even been in that part of the world, I don’t question the reasons behind staying a 1/4 mile away but how practical is it?
Are we talking a lot of open ground? forest? a mix?
Yes and no on the open ground. One thing hikers can do is wear a bear bell. It is essentially a jingle bell. People scoff at them and say, “That won’t scare a bear.” Well, no shit, but that’s not the point. Bear bells alert bears to your presence. Many attacks happen because people inadvertently sneak up on or surprise brown bears. With a bell, they hear you coming, and they’ll actively want to get out of your way - in general. Then there’s bear spray, which is a big canister of pepper spray that shoots about 30 feet. Lots of folks in Denali and Glacier carry both.
Makes lots of sense then to hunt down the “killer bear”. Why not shoot them all, since there’s no good way of predicting which will attack humans in the future?
Or you could order all humans out of the area indefinitely, which would however upset campers and those who make money selling accomodations and supplies to them.
The point is to put that particular bear down, as it has already shown it is aggressive and could repeat.
That also happens from time to time, when a bear is active and beginning to interact with humans. Making some terrain off-limits to hikers is the simplest and safest approach.
Being watched by a grizzy in the wilderness is terrifying. My son just got back from a back packing trip in yellowstone and I guess they saw a couple of them. They tend not to run away and it can be very unnerving. I am not so sure he will go back. His guide instructed then just to stay noisey and give the bear as much room as possible.
Don’t they do the same with tigers in India? Once a tiger has eaten human flesh it becomes far more dangerous than other tigers because it suddenly sees human as lunch, an edible prey.
The bear that ate Timothy Treadwell and his companion in Alaska was hunted down and killed for much the same reasons.
To the OP:
The answer is that because the bear has learned that humans are prey–and humans are very easy prey when compared to elk/deer/caribou. The NPS believes that this behavior is frowned upon by the constituency of the NPS and the bear must therefore be killed.
To GreasyJack:
The two deaths in 2011 were different bears, one male was destroyed while the attack at Wapiti was by a female thought to be defending her cubs and you are correct that she was not destroyed.
First deaths in YNP since 1986, by the way.
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If you have not seen the video from YNP this year of the idiots getting chased by a bison in YNP then Google “bison chases child”.
NPS has not said whether the tourists will be euthanized because they no longer fear bison.
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Unfortunately, a second bear was also at the kill site when authorities arrived and, although it was not instrumental in their deaths, it wouldn’t vacate the feed and it too was put down.