Conservation officers bear down on people leaving out attractants
Credit to Author: Nick Eagland| Date: Sun, 22 Dec 2019 21:16:46 +0000
The B.C. Conservation Officer Service says audits of people leaving out bear attractants in recent months led to 76 charges and 355 dangerous wildlife protection orders.
Officers began patrolling neighbourhoods and other areas in the summer and escalated their patrols in September and October. They were working to ensure people had properly secured attractants in bear-proof bins, picked excess fruits from tree and put electric fencing around livestock, according to a news release from the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change Strategy.
Following 704 inspections, 76 charges were approved and officers handed out 301 warnings and 355 dangerous wildlife protection orders, which direct a property owner to remove an attractant or face a $575 fine.
“Public safety is paramount,” Doug Forsdick, chief conservation officer, said in a news release.
“The conservation officer service cannot stress enough that the best way to keep people safe and bears from being destroyed is to secure attractants around your home, business or campsite. The conservation officer service hopes that through these attractant audits, the public will recognize that more needs to be done to ensure everyone does their part to help keep wildlife wild.”
Officers first focused on residential, recreational and commercial areas, particularly ones with a history of bear conflicts. They also focused on communities where unsecured attractants like garbage, pet food, birdseed and compost had led to issues with bears. They spent hundreds of hours educating the public and attractant management.
A second phase of audits will be done when the bears wake up in the spring.
Earlier this month, conservation officers said they were forced to kill six bears in a Port Coquitlam neighbourhood where they had become habituated to human trash, according to the Tri-City News.
In late July, three Coquitlam residents were arrested and two had their cellphones seized for allegedly interfering with conservation officers who were dealing with nuisance bears that had been rummaging through unsecured garbage in the city’s Chineside neighbourhood.
The ministry said conservation officers get more than 25,000 reports of human-wildlife each year, many of them related to bears and unsecured attractants. Fines can range from $230 to $575.
—With files from Nick Eagland