It's too bad bears aren't good at math.
They're great at eating and that's what drives them to the Tri-Cities looking for easy calories.
But if bears were better with numbers, they would know better than to hang around here because according to the most recent stats from the Coquitlam Bear Aware campaign, a fed bear equals a dead bear.
These numbers show that one bear is destroyed for every 100 calls to the Provincial Conservation Officer Service's 24-hour toll free line.
Last year, for example, 889 calls were made to Victoria by Coquitlam residents and eight bears were destroyed while four were relocated. The year previous, 930 calls were made and nine bears were destroyed and three located, and so it goes. Except for a few down years, when natural food was available, the 100:1 ratio applies.
Many blame the problem on conservation officers and will refuse to call the tip line for fear of getting a bear killed. That's the wrong decision to make because if authorities can get to a neighbourhood early enough to rid an area of a garbage problem, bears will move on, hopefully back to the forest for natural food.
Left for the problem to worsen, a neighbourhood becomes a prime eating destination for bears, as in the case of a Port Coquitlam neighbourhood last year where garbage was left unsecured and six bears had to be shot for habituation to humans' leftovers.
We don't know exactly how much bear habitat has been destroyed in recent years but we have seen a steady stream of bears coming into our neighbourhoods looking for food. Unless we take responsibility for our garbage and stay on top of the issue, we must take the blame for the bear problem.
Since the bears can't, it's up to Tri-City residents to do the math - and the right thing -by properly securing their trash and other attractants, and calling in problems as they arise.
