hey mtgirl, i need a local

[jamijams]

report...jason wants to know about a 22yr old grizzly thats being euthanized there, apparently he has been hunting some ranchers cattle over a ten year period or something...and the bear has finally been caught and they are going to slug it...read anything about it lately? he wants the whole nine yards version of the story...thanks sistah

jjams

You bring about what you think about

[mtgirl]

who is jason? anyway here's the dealio, i know just that that the bear killed over 36 animals and so they euthinized it. i was very pissed cause they had a picture of the actual injection taking place on the cover of the newspaper. i will read up on it and let you know further details, but ya know sometimes shitty things happen. thanks for showing interest jami, peace out

my chrome is shinin just like an icicle, i ride around town on my lowrider bicycle

[mtgirl]

whoops! sorry i called you jjp girl! i get your girls' names confused all the time, it was only a matter of time for my synapses to cross /images/crazy.gif

my chrome is shinin just like an icicle, i ride around town on my lowrider bicycle

[mtgirl]

Old bear's behavior proves fatal

04/19/01
By SCOTT McMILLION Chronicle Staff Writer

Nobody was laughing in Keith Aune's laboratory Wednesday night. Biologists who have spent decades making places in the world for grizzly bears had gathered there to take a patriarch out of the world, to end the life of a 22-year-old cattle killer who had been eluding traps and outsmarting people for 15 years.

The bear had made two moves that proved fatal to himself: preying on newborn calves on private land and displaying an uncharacteristic boldness around humans.

That behavior, combined with his old age, spelled out a death sentence.

"This is not a fun job," said Kevin Frey, bear management specialist in Bozeman for the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks as he, laboratory supervisor Aune and Mike Madel, a grizzly specialist from Choteau who hauled the bear here in a steel barrel trap, prepared to end the bear's life with a series of lethal injections.

The grizzly known as the Falls Creek Male had taken on an almost mythic reputation in the rough country of the Rocky Mountain Front southwest of Augusta, where he was darted from a helicopter Monday. For a dozen years he's been taking down cattle, snapping the necks and crushing the skulls of 900-pound yearlings grazing on Forest Service allotments.

He has sired uncounted offspring, survived brutal winters and dry summers and poachers and other bears, the wide scars on his forehead testifying to old battles.

He weighed in at a substantial 540 pounds, even in his slimmed-down post-hibernation condition, even though his teeth had rotted and eroded away.

Dark brown, with classic silver tips on his fur and a black hump on his shoulders, the Falls Creek Male led a wary and secretive life, seldom seen despite his penchant for beef and impressive size: he stood about 9 feet tall when upright, making him 2 feet taller than Shaquille O'Neal, nearly twice as heavy and a lot faster and stronger.

Until last week, he was smart enough to stay away from people and houses and traps, a policy that kept him alive for a long time.

Wardens had for years tried to trap him, hoping to move him to a different area. They often caught other bears, but until Monday they never got the one they aimed for.

"There's going to be something missing, to have him out of the population," said Madel.

Even one of the ranchers who has been losing cattle to him admitted to mixed feelings about the loss of the bear.

"It's kind of sad," said Tim Tew, manager of the LF Ranch. "That old bugger's been around a long time."

Still, Tew said it was time for the bear to go. He raises 1,100 cattle among an abundance of predator — lions and grizzlies, wolves and black bears — and said he's learned to live with them.

"There's good ones and bad ones," he said.

Payments from Defenders of Wildlife for cattle the bear killed had helped make the losses of up to eight animals a year more tolerable, Tew said, but the Falls Creek Male had taken up some new behavior that made him dangerous.

"I definitely think that bear had to be put down," he said.

Over the past 13 years, Tew had seen the bear only once, though he had often seen his distinctive, 6-1/2 inch tracks, sometimes on top of his own footprints. The bear was smart enough never to return to a kill once it had been discovered by a human, apparently understanding that biologists set up traps and snares at such places.

And the bear had stuck to its home range on National Forest land, where different rules about protecting bears apply. There, if accommodations are made, they usually are in favor of the bear and Tew has taken his cattle off the allotment early in past years.

But this year the bear showed up in Tew's calving grounds, several miles outside his traditional range. Tew saw him there Easter Sunday and, unlike with his previous encounters with people, the bear didn't run away, even when Tew exploded a shotgun-propelled cracker shell over his head. It took two more rounds before the bear left, reluctantly. Between Good Friday and Monday, he killed a half dozen calves.

There happened to be a Montana Department of Livestock helicopter in the area, killing coyotes, and when the shooters spotted the bear they darted it. Madel found the remnants of a tattoo inside his lip, identifying him as bear number 346, the cattle killer from a few miles south.

Bosses at FWP and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service were consulted and they decided the bear should be killed.

His new dining habits and his age, combined with the probability that, if relocated he probably would either return home or kill cattle someplace else, put him inside the parameters of the complicated federal rules that spell out when grizzlies can be killed, Madel explained.

Aune, who had trapped the bear for research purposes in 1985, but only after a lot of work and considerably trickery, pushed the plunger on the lethal injection Wednesday. He said the bear's rotting teeth probably led him to seek the easier meals of newborn calves despite the risks of nearby people.

One canine tooth was as blunt as a man's thumb. Another was rotten and oozing pus. His molars were worn down to nubs.

"They're just not able to perform any more," Aune said. "They can't function."

Though he was still in good shape, the bear's days in the wild probably were numbered anyway. Releasing him was dangerous to cattle and possibly to humans, so he got a series of injections. Anesthesia first put him into a deep sleep. Then repeated shots of thick pink fluid from hypodermics the size of toothpaste tubes sent him over the edge. His breathing gradually slowed until it stopped.

Robins chirped outside, a faucet dripped tinnily into a steel sink, Madel stroked the bear's head and the unpleasant job was done.

jami, here are some of my thoughts. i am a fish and wildlife major, so this is important stuff to me. the biologists mentioned, keith aune and kevin frye are two people who i have a great amount of respect for. in my mind, this time the appropriate manament action was taken. it is terrible to have to do such a thing, but it is very disrespectful to ranchers to expect them to constantly take it in the shorts. since the old bear was a male, his loss to the population won't have much of an affect on the growth rate of the population. i still can't believe tho that they put the picture of this amazing animals demise on the front page. there goes the fucking media again.

[jamijams]

thanks mt girl! hope youre having a good saturday! /images/smile.gif

p.s. jason's the boyfriend of almost six years

You bring about what you think about

[13throwcenter]

thanks for sharing, kate... what will be interesting for you in the future is seeing the effects of evolution amongst the bears he has sired.... did he pass on his intelligence that resulted in his longevity... will there be a whole generation of badass bears roaming the rough country of the Rocky Mountain Front southwest of Augusta? Should be interesting to watch their behavior in the future.

I have friends whose dog's name is Choteau! /images/shocked.gif

"I fucking *LOVE* Eddie Vedder!" ~S.Heinrich, 4-20-2001

[mtgirl]

choteau is where my hot prof works! i am wasted now. the real genetically fit bears of the future will stay the fuck away from ppl and livestock and everything. one time i had a griz encounter. it was cool.

my chrome is shinin just like an icicle, i ride around town on my lowrider bicycle

[mtgirl]

damna six years is a long time. i hope he doesn't mind all the shananagens around here!

my chrome is shinin just like an icicle, i ride around town on my lowrider bicycle

[jamijams]

fucking tell me about it....this is make believe land kate, for me anyways. and other than that, ill just say that its all a big mess right now and today, i just want to take my dog, get in my car, and drive forever, never having to see another face i know (cept mom and dad and bro of course).

and tell me about the griz run in. i only ever saw black bears in alaska.

You bring about what you think about

[mtgirl]

hey jami, i got a car, got some gas, let's get the fuck outta here, get outta here fast.

anyhoe, the griz dealio: i was out tracking my antelope and i noticed in the distance a cow elk and a coyote who were chasing each other around. i figured that the cow was trying to defend her calf. i kept after the antelope and their signals happened to be coming from the direction of the coyote and elk. i ended up on a knoll just above the coyote and elk, they were below, but i couldn't see them since they were right at the base of the hill. i heard a squeal and was amazed to think that the coyote got past the elk, and curiously went wandering down the hill. a few steps later i saw the calf killer, it was a griz and it was carrying the calf in it's mouth. it was about 30 yards away and i was alone. i released the safety on my bear spray and started talking in a monotone voice and slowly backed up a few steps till the bear was out of sight and then sang my way back to the road. whoa was that some scary shit. you've been to alaska huh? i would really love to go there sometime. where did you go?

my chrome is shinin just like an icicle, i ride around town on my lowrider bicycle

[jamijams]

:(

i grew up in alaska, there until i was 12 or so. lived in anchorage, wasilla, and on kodiak island. :) its awesome there.

You bring about what you think about

[Highway23]

i've always wanted to go there :)

[jamijams]

highway, i just emailed you a pic of my house in alaska, check it out!

You bring about what you think about

[Highway23]

HOLY SHIT!!!!!!

what an amazing house!!! I love log cabins so much!!! damn! thanks for sending it


and yer doggy is cutie patooty!!! hehehhe/images/laugh.gif

[jamijams]

my dad built it from the ground up with about five friends...it was really a great house, it had a fully finished basement also. we had 2.5 acres there, tons and tons of moose would come through our yard, our driveway was half a mile long, and id have to wait out there for the bus at 6 am, scared shitless knowing big ol' moose were hangin out! /images/smile.gif

thanks boulie, i needed that /images/smile.gif

You bring about what you think about

[mtgirl]

i smell a road trip for 3 jammers;) and on before we go we can go stay at my cabin for boulie k?

my chrome is shinin just like an icicle, i ride around town on my lowrider bicycle