Travesty of runaway grizzly Boo is more than any animal should bear
Alan Ferguson, The Province
Published: Wednesday, June 28, 2006
Given the tendency of people to attribute human feelings to animals, I suspect many of you are rooting for Boo the bear to make it in the wild on this, his second break for freedom.
I wish I could share in this romantic notion of a tamed beast recalled to nature, but all I see is a tragic set of circumstances compounded by human incompetence.
I feel sorry for Boo, I really do. If he were a human, and not a four-year-old grizzly, no doubt he'd be doing time somewhere, given his traumatic start in life.
There he was, out for a
family stroll with his brother, when a hunter pulls up in a truck and shoots his mother.
The hunter gets away with a $9,000 fine; Boo's reward is to be taken into captivity by members of the same species that murdered his mom.
By the time he first broke out of his pen at the Kicking Horse Mountain Resort near Golden, Boo was already beyond redemption.
Habituated to his jailers, he was always going to be a
danger to humans as a bear on the loose.
Raw instinct -- in the form of a passing sow in heat -- appears to have been the trigger for Boo's initial escape.
And when, after a brief fling in the woods, the sow took off, as sows do, Boo was discovered loitering close by the only place he knows as home.
Sedated and airlifted back to the resort, his handlers expected he would settle back in, ready to receive a
no-doubt endless horde of curiosity-seekers throughout the summer.
To this end, elaborate precautions were taken to ensure the bear never got out again.
But he did, smashing down a 180-kilogram steel door, shouldering his way through two live electric fences and scrambling over a 3.6-metre fence.
As in a scene from King Kong, the fleeing beast left a trail of destruction.
Michael Dalzell, a spokesman for Kicking Horse, was taken aback.
"It was absolutely impossible," he said, "but he found a way. It was basically like breaking out of Fort Knox."
Dalzell also offered his opinion that Boo must be a "pretty smart and determined bear."
My guess is the bear was more likely deranged.
After two weeks in the wild, he must have been mad as hell to suddenly find himself back behind bars.
Nobody has any idea what to do next, of course. They had been going to castrate the beast, to relieve him of his animal lusts.
But first they have to catch him, and a repeat performance with the tranquilizer gun is going to start looking very much like cruel and unusual punishment.
On the other hand, Boo is clearly no less of a danger to humans now than when he first escaped.
Perhaps, instead of going back to the resort, he could be airlifted to some remote bear country.
We can wish for a happy outcome, but I wouldn't bank on it. The day Boo crossed paths with humans he was doomed. And it wouldn't surprise me at all if some bozo isn't on a phone right now, negotiating to have Boo star in the movie of his sorry life.