Rotary learns about grizzly bears
October 13, 2011
Idaho Fish and Game Senior Biologist Wayne Wakkinen, left, Rotary president Wilma Devore, and IDFG Conservation Officer Greg Johnson.
Rotary Club photo
At their meeting Tuesday, October 4, Boundary County Rotarians learned more about a critter that's made a lot of news lately in the county, the grizzly bear, and they heard it from two of the people in the county who likely know more on the subject than anyone else in the world.

Idaho Fish and Game Conservation Officer and Rotarian Greg Johnson, who's been patrolling the county's back country for almost 30 years, and IDFG senior wildlife biologist Wayne Wakkinen, who's spent more than 20 years focused mainly on grizzly bear recovery, were the meeting's guest speakers.

Johnson spoke of the two local cases that have garnered national attention, two incidents compounded by other grizzly bear/human encounters that occurred this year. He spoke of the May incident in which Jeremy Hill, reacting to three grizzly bears on his property and the threat they posed, shot and killed a two-year old male grizzly bear and faced federal prosecution for his attempt to protect his family, as well as the September 16 incident that left both a hunter, Steve Stevenson, dead, a grizzly bear, mistaken for a black bear, dead as well, and a young man, Ty Bell, 20, forced to live the rest of his life with the knowlege that in trying to save his friend by shooting the bear, he caused his friend's death.

According to Johnson, most bear encountersin Boundary County occur on the west side of the Kootenai River in the Selkirk Mountain recovery zone, where it's estimated to hold about 80 grizzlies. The east side of the river, he said, has approximately 50 grizzly bears.

According to senior IDFG Senior Fish and Game Biologist Wayne Wakkinen, conditions are improving for the grizzly bear, but by a very slim margin.
"There is a perception by many residents that there are grizzly bears everywhere," Wakkinen told those in attendance. "Density studies have shown that there are between 50 and 72 grizzly bears inhabiting the entire Selkirk Mountain ecosystem including Idaho and British Columbia. This trend represents about a three-percent poplulation growth. There are less bears in the Cabinet-Yaak ecosystem east of the Kootenai River."

He described many of the techniques used to keep track of the bears, and described their life cycles, saying that breeding females, typicallybeginning at age six or seven, have offspring every third year, and that cubs typically stay with their mother for two years.

He said that more of the bears are coming to lower elevations, and warned that people should recognize the trend, and take steps to avoid enticing hungry bears.

"There are no laws or ordinances in Idaho to prevent the feeding of grizzly bears," he said. "Consequently, there have been some cases in which grizzlies have had to be destroyed because of the encroachment onto and into populated areas."

Despite this, he said, there are more grizzly bears living in this neck of the woods, and for the first time in a long time, reproduction is ahead of mortality.