Lisa Thomson, Nelson’s Wildsafe BC community coordinator, emerged from hibernation on Apr. 18, and she’s already been busy.
Wildsafe BC is the leading organization within the province for reducing human-wildlife conflict.
Thomson explained that Wildsafe’s role is to promote education on wildlife awareness and collaborate with different city entities to find the best local solutions for wildlife concerns.
She said that Wildsafe is not involved in dealing with harmful wildlife interactions, but rather ensures community members are aware of the rules, regulations, and recommendations on how to prevent them.
“You should be contacting conservation if there’s a problem with wildlife. If you’ve got wildlife breaking into your house or property, or a bear that’s being aggressive towards you, any of those issues should be addressed to the conservation officer service on the RAP line,”
“You can contact Wildsafe if you have concerns about your neighbor perhaps feeding wildlife, which is illegal and carries a heavy fine, regardless of if it’s a bear or a raccoon.”
Last year the city had significantly fewer bears euthanized than the year prior. In 2022, local conservation officers shot 17 bears within the city limits, but in 2023, that number shrunk to just one.
Thomson said last year’s reduction in bear fatalities could have to do with more awareness of how to reduce harmful human-wildlife interactions within the community.
However, she said that could be different this year if other bears move into to take over the territory of the ones who were killed.
“Mostly people did become a lot more diligent in managing their attractants last year. We had a lot of bears in town in 2022, and now they were fatally taken out of town and there was that void,” she said.
“I would suspect in either this year or next year, we could see a repeat of that with other bears then moving down into free space. So it’s really important that we manage our attractants and employ bear smart practices to avoid that from happening again.”
Nelson also had a family of three grizzly bears move into the city last fall, which Thomson was heavily involved in dealing with.
She said that it’s hard to say whether the family will come back again this year or not, but that Wildsafe BC hopes they don’t.
“In terms of them coming back we hope that they don’t. The boy cubs were about two and a half when they were around last year, so they’ll be three or four now and being boys or males, they will be looking to disperse and find their territory.”
However, she adds that grizzly bears are more maternally invested with their offspring compared to black bears, so it’s not uncommon for them to hang around with their mom for a lot longer than usual.
Thomson urges community members to remain diligent in ensuring wildlife attractants are removed from their yards for the 2024 wildlife season and wanted to remind the community of the risks of not following conservation bylaws.
“We’ve already received reports of people not managing their garbage and people actively feeding wildlife and putting out cans of cat food and such for them, which is a big no-no. It’s also time to remove your bird feeders; they’re a high-calorie food source for wildlife. Take them down; there is a bylaw fine if you have them out during bear season, which is April until November.”
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