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Grizzly Bear Decline Alarms Conservationists in Canada
First it was the giant panda, then the polar bear, now it seems that the grizzly bear is the latest species to face impending disaster.
Grizzly or Alaskan Brown Bear with chum salmon in summer. Photograph: Thomas Kitchin & Victoria Hurst/Getty Images/All Canada Photos A furious row has erupted in Canada with conservationists desperately lobbying the government to suspend the annual bear-hunting season following reports of a sudden drop in the numbers of wild bears spotted on salmon streams and key coastal areas where they would normally be feeding.
The government has promised to order a count of bears, but not until after this year's autumn trophy hunts have taken place. It has enraged ecology groups which say that a dearth of salmon stocks may be responsible for many bears starving in their dens during hibernation. The female grizzlies have their cubs during winter after gorging themselves in September on the fish fats that sustain them through the following months.
"I've never seen bears hungry in the fall before, but last year they were starving," said British Columbian wildlife guide and photographer Doug Neasloss. "I noticed in the spring there weren't as many bears coming out, but I felt it was premature to jump to conclusions." But now, he said, "there just aren't any bears. It's scary."
It was the same story, he said, from other guides over 16 rivers where once they would have been encountering dozens of grizzly bears. "There has been a huge drop in numbers. I've never experienced anything this bad." Reports from stream walkers, who monitor salmon streams across the vast territories, have been consistent, according to the conservation group Pacific Wild - no bears, and more worryingly, no bear cubs.
"There are just no bears out there, I'm hearing that from every side now," said Ian McAllister from Pacific Wild. He said that because a few grizzlies have been wandering close to centres of human habitation people thought there were plenty of bears around. "In fact it's the shortage of food that's driving them into town. They're starving," he explained.
In one river alone, the Fraser on Canada's west coast, 10 million sockeye salmon were expected back to spawn there this summer. Only one million turned up. Canada's Ministry of Environment announced in July that it would ban hunting of grizzly bears on an additional 470,000 hectares, bringing the total protected area for grizzlies and black bears to 1.9 million hectares.
The news came after Jane Goodall, the renowned wildlife campaigner, added her voice to the campaign against the hunts, which are for trophies, not meat.
"I'm very distressed and shocked that the bear hunt - grizzly bear and black bear - is continuing in a country like Canada," she said. "These bears are such amazing, magnificent creatures and there are so many secrets still to discover about their lives."
Grizzlies once roamed across most of North America and the Great Plains until European settlers gradually pushed them back. Only 1,000 remain in the contiguous US, where they are protected, but the number is less clear in the vast wilds of Canada and Alaska, where they are prized by hunters who shoot hundreds of the 350kg giants every year, providing a lucrative income for provincial governments that license the hunts. "It's appalling wildlife management, considering the widespread concern for coastal bears at the moment," said McAllister.
Indigenous groups have added their voice to the call to save the bears, pointing out that trophy hunting is against their traditions and threatens tourism, which is a vital source of income for the remote areas of Canada.
But a senior biologist with the US National Wildlife Federation said the evidence remained anecdotal and called the reports "alarmist". Bears would not starve so quickly because of the decline in salmon while there were other food sources, such as berries, around, Sterling Miller told reporters. He said the long-term impact of the salmon decline on bears was a serious issue, but several years of data would need to be compiled to reveal a change in population trends.
A report released last week showed species numbers to have fallen dramatically in the province of Alberta, where local officials have decided to suspend the annual hunting season despite intense lobbying from hunters. "There's no question that bears are worse off now than 20 years ago - both in numbers and range," said Jim Pissot, of the group Defenders of Wildlife.
17 Comments so far
Show AllWhere do we write to stop the bear trophy hunt? Thanks.
I came across 2 grizzlies while hiking in Alaska about 10 years ago. Jesus H. Christ, it was a tense moment. They are HUGE. These two just wandered across the trail and went on their merry way like we weren't even there. We knew they were grizzlies right away - they have a very distinctive look, and they are bigger than black and brown bears. It was unnerving.
I've backpacked all over the west, incluidng in grizzly habitat, and that is the only time I've ever seen grizzlies. Usually they are not around when you're in the back country. But when you do get a taste of them up close, it's anxiety provoking, to say the least.
I'm sorry to hear their populations are dwindling, though. :-(
The brown bear (Ursus arctos) _IS_ the grizzly bear.
The Governmnet of BC is doing all in their power to support FARMED salmon. This at the cost of the Wild species.
The Primary reason Salmon runs drop in BC are Global warming ,overfishing and destruction of habitat.
The knee jerk "fix" is to farm Salmon. These Salmon farms merely compound the problem because they are located in areas that wild species migrate through and contaminates those stocks with all manner of diseases and parasites.
The "fix" to the problems of disease and parasites in farmed stocks is dousing them with Chemicals and anti-biotics. This creates more resistant diseases and parasites. This makes them an even greater threat to wild stocks.
It is like watching an episode of Fawlty Towers really where everything we do to FIX it using MANS accepted methods in fact make matters worse.
There was an article on this in a Canadian Newspaper this weekend btw. When I read it I could not help but be struck as to how Nature's balance works.
These bears haul thousands of Salmon out of the river yet only eat certain parts of each. Wasteful one might say but 80 percent of what they eat are Salmon that have already spawned and are about to die.
They haul the Salmon into the woods that line the river and the leftovers feed all manners of scavngers and help to enrich the soil with much needed Nutrients. This soil helps to grow trees and plants along the riverbanks which helps to keep those rivers CLEAN of silt and the water cool which in turn promotes a healthy enviroment for the fish.
If we want to learn how to build a sustainable world we need look no further then nature. Rather then trying to dominate her with our Science and technology, we should work with her. She has more to teach us then we will ever know.
Want to hunt the most dangerous game in wild and exotic locations and get rich while doing it? Join Blackwater (Xe) and hunt people. It's just dangerous enough for chickenhawks, but not too dangerous with our remote controlled robots. And you get to shoot the latest weapons and cool explosive devices and test them on real mud people who mostly can't shoot back. Then you can bring back trophies you took from their homes and make money selling fresh organs. Best of all, you can rape, pillage, plunder, torture and murder, protected from any and all legal ramifications by our conservative politicians. What's not to like?
The problem is that there are too many bears feeding on too few salmon. Hunting the bears would actually reduce the competition for the food and make survival of the bears which are not killed more likely. When and if the salmon stocks return then the bears could quickly repopulate.
The article quotes several people as saying that there just are no bears out there. If that is true then there is no need to stop the hunting season because the hunters will not find anything to shoot. Hunting bears that are not there would be like going out to hunt tyrannosaurs...good excercise and no danger at all to tyrannosaurs!
Killing bears will help them survive? That's what the govmint says we're doing for humans in Iraq and AfPak.
Are you as much of an idiot as you appear? God what an ass, and astonishingly ignorant at the same time.
You are assuming that the cause of the salmon decline is too many bears. That is a huge assumption. There have been no grizzlies in Northern California since the 1920s and the salmon are now in serious decline there too. There must be another reason(s).
Joe
Salmon have disappeared or declined in some areas of N. California, causing the shutdown of the salmon fishing industry. Locals claim the reason is the serious diversion of water from rivers and streams toward the wine industry and other industrial agriculture further south. You can see many dry river beds in the northern woods. Without a flow of river waters into the Northern Pacific, there is no way for salmon to swim upstream and spawn.
I wonder if water management or water quality could be a part of the problem in Canada.
Joe
The US Wildlife employee in his comments, sought to diminish, the anecdotal reports of the bear population crash by falling back on the supposed Scientific Method. By stating that a few years of observation and counting were needed to validate the anecdotal claims of a bear population crash.
Moreover he falsely submitted that bears could get their nesasary extra hundreds of thounds of calories and protien they need for winter hibernation from berries. That is patently and scientifically false.Absolute junk were his thoughts.
The state and federal goverments in the USA have already recognized the crash in salmon populations along the Pacific Ocean.So at the recomendations of the Wildlife Service and noted ecology groups. The salmon season has been curtailed and dramatically shortened along the west coast.To try and bring back the fish.
The salmon population has dropped dramatically even in Alaska.Year after year of industrial fishing has caused has caused the once rich fishing grounds to become nearly sterile and barren.
Industrial fishing is the known and accepted cause of the Atlantic Ocean's Grand Banks to become barren of codfish. That not long ago were so filled with codfish you could walk on them across on the ocean's waters.
In Puget Sound Washington State, there is great concern for the native Orca population.The salmon population there has dwindled dramaticaly too.Also due to industrial fishing just beyond America's ocean border.
The thigh bone is connected to the hip bone. The bear population is connected to the spawning salmon.
The ecology of the Earth's biosphere is in terrible trouble. It is in such bad shape, all you need to do is eyeball it to see that it is not well.
Anecdotal but accurate. We don't need a few years of study to scientifically apprehend that the world's cornicopia of seafood is no longer a cornicopia.Endangering the ocean's wildlife and the creatures on the shoreline that also depend on it's bounty.A bounty that is quickly vanishing.
We and nature's other creatures are in a triage situation with regard to the balance of nature. There is plenty of scientific and anecdotal evidence to support this claim. Man has pooped on his own food and raked the ocean nearly barren.We do not and nor do the salmon and bears have the time for years of study.
It may not be long as many scientists and others claim before the human population begins to crash from a lack of food. Because of our intensely stupid ways of interacting with our biosphere.
Soon we may look like and act as lemmings. Throwing ourselves off a cliff to our deaths, because of our horrid and destructive ways.
Excellent excellent excellent post. Terribly sad and true. Every decision-maker should be required to read this daily before digesting the "news".
Kayaker, nice try with that specious argument about needing to kill more bears in order to save them. Sounds a bit like that Vietnamese village doesn't it?
Anyway your assumption with your argument is that all the individual salmon going up the river are available to all the Grizzly bears all of the time. In other words each fish will pass by all the bears waiting there there night and day and able to cover the entire width of the river, so that they all have an equal chance at it. Clearly, that is a crock to anyone who thinks about it for a moment.
The other bit about not needing to worry because there are no Grizzlies - you need to read into that a little. Grizzlies didn't just disappear overnight -there are a lot less so these people are seeing none. The people mentioned are not everywhere instantly.
"Government analysts insist that field reports of a sudden decline in the human population should not lead to any sudden action, but require years of careful study to determine if anecdotal reports of a 'massive die-off' bear any relationship to the loss of 'ecosystem services' from a depleted Earth..."
I am sad to inform readers that the senior biologist with the US National Wildlife Federation who said the evidence remained anecdotal and called the reports "alarmist" has died.
While gathering longitudinal data on salmon rivers he drowned while crossing one that was scientifically proven to be only an average 2 feet deep.
Dress the politicians pushing for the hunt this year up as grizzly bears and put them out in the wild where there'll be hunting. It'd help to clean up or out the government and bring some relief for the population; or the populations, of people and (more civilized but nevertheless) wild animals. We could consider this as conservation, of Nature and our minds or peace of mind. After all, bears [deserve] respect, as all wild animals do, while the corrupt politicians, these soulless fiends, deserve [no] respect and should not get any. Now that's being conservative in a true sense of the word; imo.