First bear of year shot in August

The North Shore lost its first black bear of the season after the bruin became too accustomed to humans.

Conservation officers shot the young male bear, captured along Ridgeway Avenue in North Vancouver, on Aug. 21.

"In this particular case, this bear was becoming quite habituated," said conservation officer Ashley Page. "A lot of residents were not storing their garbage correctly, so it was going from property to property and as a result of doing that, it just became quite comfortable around people."

Conservation officers decide, at that level of habituation, what their other management options are, she said.

"In this case we decided that it was best to put the bear down," said Page.

Page said the bear, which was tagged, had been relocated once before on July 24. The tag had been ripped from its ear, making it difficult to trace the bear's history and how many other times it had been relocated.

"We've relocated two this season, one of them being this one bear that came back," said Page.

Tony Webb, chairman of the North Shore Black Bear Network said the fact that only one bear has been shot to date is great news.

"We've had a good year in the sense that we've only had one bear killed to date and that's due to a lot of public diligence," said Webb.

"I think that people are beginning to live with bears and understand them and sort of realize that we're living in a very unique area of the world, I think that message is beginning to get through."

Webb said that although it's getting better, there is still work to be done.

"It's analogous to driving cars, you can never let your guard down, you've always got to be with it," he said. "We've got to appreciate that we're on the North Shore and the mountains to the north of us harbour a lot of bears and such. And we've got to learn to live with them."

Page advises residents to remove all attractants from their property during bear season.

"If you remove your bird feeders, store your garbage correctly, pick the fruit from your trees, anything you can do to remove all attractants," she said. "Yes we do have bears in the area but if there's no reason for the bear to visit your property it will just pass by - and that's the best outcome we can all hope for."