The TV news last night told the miraculous story of a man who was out walking in the woods with his two dogs and was attacked by a mother bear trying to protect her 2 cubs. The man describes his horrific experience and his fear for his dogs' lives. He stated: "No way were they going to hurt my babies". The story concluded with the news that he was finally able to beat the adult bear to death with a huge stick.
That, unfortunately, is not the end of this tale.

It goes on to tell us that after he got to safety and told of this attack, the two cubs were subsequently found, shot and killed. The reason? It was 'thought' that these two little babes COULD become dangerous.

I'm wondering how this decision was made, and by whom. Does some human have a magic ball that shows that these young cubs will kill in the future? Has research shown a way to predict exactly which young bears will inevitably kill humans when they grow up?

There is a wonderful wildlife recovery centre here on Vancouver Island that has 4 rescued bear cubs whose mothers were killed, who are being well cared for until they are old enough to be released into the wild. That is the mandate of centres such as this and I am sure these two cubs could easily have joined the group.

Sadly, this situation is not uncommon. We all know that wildlife is suffering because of mankind's encroachment into their territory. Building homes on land that once belonged to the creatures is shrinking their territory, and they are all being murdered when they return to their once safe turf. Now it seems that when mankind walks deliberately into the wilderness, knowing full well that these lands are sheltering wildlife, and encounters an animal roaming with her young, that animal and her young will suffer a deadly fate. In fact, at the end of the piece, the man bravely states that he will certainly not stop walking into the deep woods - and he'll take his two 'babies' with him. The implication in the piece was that this was a very brave guy, who will face that danger again in his macho way - consequences to all be damned.

Diane Esther
Coombs, BC
P.S. - Lest someone think that I believe he should have let the dam kill him, please be assured that is not my focus in this post.