As the Government of Alberta reviews the death of Charlie, a rehabilitated orphan black bear that was killed mere weeks after its release in June, the rehabilitators are hopeful the incident won’t be used to prevent the rescue of future orphans.
In 2012, the province banned the rehabilitation of orphan bears, along with a number of other wildlife. The ban was predicated on the opinion that certain species presented a greater risk due to the possibility of the spread of disease or human contact after they are reintroduced into the wild.
Following the implementation of the Alberta Environment and Park’s Bear Rehabilitation protocol in 2018, which came amidst intense public outcry over the killing of orphaned bears, the Cochrane Ecological Institute (CEI) was granted permission to rehabilitate Charlie and a second bear cub, Mascwa.
In June 2019, government officials released Mascwa and Charlie. Less than a month later, Charlie was killed after he wandered on to private property and was said to have been a threat to children and exhibiting habituated behaviour.
On July 12, the Cochrane Eagle was granted a tour of CEI’s rehabilitation facility and a walkthrough of its bear rehabilitation process.
From its architectural design that includes sight barriers in all its enclosures, an elevated observation tower to procedures that limit human contact with the bears, CEI is focused on preventing habituation.
“They were never fed at the same time, never fed in the same spot, food would be tossed over the fence in different locations. Every effort was made so they couldn’t see the food was being provided by humans,” said Lisa Dahlseide, conservation biologist and the CEI’s education director. She emphasized her point by pointing to the nine-foot walls that surround the bear enclosure. “I don’t know of any other facility anywhere that has this size enclosures. One of the most successful bear rehabs in the United States is actually in a town and they just have totally man-made enclosures and they are very successful.”
Even when Mascwa and Charlie were infants and required bottle-feeding, human contact was limited and the animals were weaned as quickly as possible.
“I have been volunteering here for 24 years, I’ve never pet a bear, I’ve never been involved in the rehab process. I am education director so I educate people on what the rehab process is. We only have Clio, her daughter, Catriona, and a former employee, Mike, who was here when Charlie and Mascwa were here,” said Dahlseide.
Both Dahlseide and CEI executive director Clio Smeeton worry Charlie’s death will lead the government to reinstitute its rehabilitation ban pointing to an increase in potential human conflict.
Smeeton, who is considered a world-renowned expert on the subject with almost six decades of experience in wildlife rehabilitation, said Charlie’s death doesn’t support a conclusion of greater habituation. However, Smeeton said it does support previously gathered data on bear releases and the CEI’s argument that the government erred when choosing to release Charlie in the summer.
“It supports the Pennsylvania statistics that you get 88 per cent survival with a winter release. With Charlie being killed it still supports the same statistics that you get a 55 per cent survival with a summer release, one’s dead one’s alive. It’s not an indication that it doesn’t work,” Smeeton said.
Smeeton and Dahlseide also point to the CEI’s success rate in bear rehabilitation before the government became involved.
Since the 1980s, the CEI has rehabilitated and successfully released 19 bears back into the wild with no indication of human conflict.
While Environment and Parks told the Cochrane Eagle there is not enough data to support that claim, Smeeton counters there is no evidence to discount it either.
“Fifteen years of releasing bears and we never lost a bear. All our bears were marked, a certain number had transmitters. We asked the government in 2010/2011 why they brought in this prohibition and had there been any record of human wildlife conflict as a result of wildlife rehab? They said, ‘no,’” said Smeeton, who added she was given the same response in October 2018. “They have to record human wildlife conflict. All our bears are marked so if anyone came up and complained about a bear and they shot a bear they would have seen it was marked and as they don’t have any record of any marked bears, we can only draw the conclusion we haven’t lost a bear.”
Armed with that data, the CEI made a few recommendations to government prior to the release of the bears, all were ignored.
Among those recommendations were to push the release of the bears to the winter, to choose a less populated area to release Charlie and to release the animals together.
Dahlseide said releasing the bears in the spring leads to elevated stress and more human contact.
“AEP decided to release in the spring, which meant the bears had to be trapped. The bears, who were not used to having people around them ever, except when they were infants, now suddenly there’s all these people and trucks and weird things being put in here,” she explained.
For a winter release, the CEI has a man-made hibernacula it uses. After the bears fall asleep, they can be drugged and the door to the artificial den can be closed. The unit is then placed on a truck for easy transport to the release area where the door is removed and snowpack added so when the bears do wake up it is as natural a process as possible.
“The last bears before the ban on bear rehabilitation were released in 2012, there were four of them and one of them did wake up. But, when we got to the release site he did walk around a bit but did end up going back into the den,” said Dahlseide.
Releasing the bears separately was another error in Dahlseide and Smeeton’s opinion, for two reasons.
The first is the fact Charlie’s release location, they believe, was too populated. Dahlseide said that points to a flaw in the government protocol that states bears have to be released where they were found.
“He was orphaned for a reason and animals are generally not orphaned by natural causes, it’s usually a human conflict that causes that situation,” said Dahlseide. “So their protocol stating they have to be released where they were found doesn’t seem like the best protocol to have. What if they’re found in a campground or a golf course. We hope that they can adjust that part of the protocol and take our advice.”
The second reason is cost. The taxpayer does not pay for the rehabilitation process and the government does not provide any financial support to rehabilitation facilities.
“Not only would it have been better for the bears, the release part was the taxpayer, because it was AEP doing the release and (releasing them together) would have been so much cheaper.”
The CEI would also like to see the protocol changed to remove the restriction that bears cannot be rehabilitated after July 1.
“In the meantime, they killed six orphans that we’re aware of,” said Dahlseide.
The government could not confirm that claim.
“To our knowledge, there have been no other orphan bears killed in Alberta. However, Alberta Environment and Parks may not be aware of all bear incidents across the province,” the department responded via email. “Alberta’s black bear populations are healthy and are not a conservation concern. Black bear cub rehabilitation has no impact on populations or the long-term management of black bears.”
While Smeeton is grateful the province is working to fill the gap on bear rehabilitation in the province, she would like to see it based on better science and be better supported.
“There is no earmarked funding for wildlife rescue and rehabilitation but the act recognizes it’s desirable for the public. The downside is there is no purpose-built facilities, there is no purpose-provided money for civil servants to be trained,” Smeeton said.
“The State of Colorado pays for wildlife rehab so obviously the state accountants look at the cost to residents and if you release unsuccessfully that is a waste of money. So if you release bear cubs at the wrong time of year in the wrong place you are throwing away taxpayers dollars.”
Dahlseide adds she wants government policy to better recognize not only the animal protection act but the Species at Risk Act, which includes Grizzly Bears – a species banned from rescue.
“The Alberta Wildlife Act states that anybody who is a licensed rehabilitator can rehabilitate all Alberta’s wildlife. Alberta says they are owners of wildlife. The Animal Protection Act states owners cannot cause distress to animals,” said Dahlseide. “If someone finds baby raccoons and (the government) says just leave them, they are going to die. If a person did that to a bunch of kittens they would be charged.”
Both Dahlseide and Smeeton are committed to working with the government to improve wildlife rehabilitation polices and emphasize the fact the CEI is a global leader on the subject.
“(Clio) is a renowned expert on reintroduction of species. Every swift fox in Canada came from this facility or are grandchildren or great grandchildren of animals from this facility. We have governments sending people from across the world to talk to Clio specifically,” said Dahlseide.
