A forestry company employee is recovering in a Winnipeg hospital following a vicious attack from a black bear in Northwestern Ontario.
By Mike Aiken / Miner and News / Thursday September 22, 2005
A forestry company employee is recovering in a Winnipeg hospital following a vicious attack from a black bear in Northwestern Ontario. About 4 a.m. Wednesday, employees of Moose Creek Reforestation working in the Pakwash Forest between Ear Falls and Red Lake -- about 150 km northeast of Kenora -- were asleep when one of them was dragged from their tent into the woods.
“This bear meant business. He wasn’t going to back off,” Bill Skene, an Abitibi-Consolidated contractor, said.
While the others tried to beat away the predator from their colleague, the animal reared and threatened to swat his tormentors, before dragging the man further from his tent. The employees were eventually successful in saving the man, who was rushed to an ambulance for medical attention.
Medical staff at the Red Lake hospital transferred him to Health Sciences Centre in Winnipeg, where the victim was reported to be in stable condition, with puncture wounds and abrasions to his back, upper arm, head and shoulder.
“This is terrible. Something has to be done. There’s too many bears out there,” said Skene in calling for better controls on aggressive bears.
Skene, a veteran of the logging business, said he’s seen more nuisance bears this year than any other in his 20-year career. Although equipped with pepper spray in case of an attack, the employee never had a chance to use it, Skene said, adding the man had been working in the bush for much of the past eight years.
Poor berry crops
“There’s a bear problem in Ontario and the government has to deal with it,” Skene said.
The attack is likely related to poor berry crops and a lack of food in the woods this summer, causing the bear to do unusual things in search of food, said Norm Hissop, Kenora spokesman for the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources.
It has nothing to do with the demise of the spring bear hunt in Ontario, he said. “That’s the knee-jerk reaction,” said Hissop.
While Hissop reported only one incident in Kenora last year and six across his MNR territory, his statistics are already well above those levels for this year, he said. However, Hissop noted there are similar problems in Manitoba -- even though the province has a spring and fall bear hunt in place.
The attack is the latest in a number of reports from across the country, including attacks on farm animals in the Kenora area earlier in the month and on Sept. 6, a Cambridge, Ont. woman was killed and her husband mauled by a black bear in Missinaibi Lake Provincial Park, about 80 kms north of Chapleau.
In Manitoba, Harvey Robinson, 68, was killed Aug. 26 after encountering a black bear near his home in the Rural Municipality of St. Clements. Earlier this month, Lac du Bonnet farmer Dennis Heckert and his dog were also attacked but lived to tell the tale. (*)
