Gamekeepers say the bear constituted a threat to humans, had to be killed

Feb 23, 2013 09:59 GMT  ·  By

Gamekeepers in Switzerland have recently shot and killed the country's only remaining wild bear on account of its constituting a threat to human communities.

More precisely, the people who tracked down Mike, as this bear was called, and killed it maintain that, because some individuals were quite courteous towards this bear and offered it food on a regular basis, the animal took up the habit of following people around.

Furthermore, Daily Mail says that, not very long ago, the bear was even spotted walking around a school, and that it even broke into a home in Graubuenden back in 2012.

Therefore, it was likely that the bear would at one point end up attacking somebody, perhaps even a child, simply because it had no fear of humans and did not shy away from approaching them whenever circumstances allowed for it.

“The bear M13 had certainly never showed any aggression toward man, but the risk that an accident might happen and that people might be badly injured or killed had become intolerable,” reads a statement issued by the country's Federal Environment Office.

Information made available to the public thus far says that the bear was killed earlier this week in Poschiavo Valley, in The Alps, fairly close to the Italian border.

Presently, conservationists cannot help but wonder why the Swiss Federal Environment Office did not attempt relocating Mike to some other parts of the country, where human communities were few and far in between and therefore the bear would have no longer threatened anybody.

As they put it, Mike never displayed any aggressive behavior towards humans, which is why having gamekeepers kill it was an utterly uncalled for measure.

More so given the fact that Mike, whose official name was M13, was fitted with a radio collar which allowed the country's authorities to monitor its movements through the area on a daily basis, thus making sure that its journeys through the country did not represent a threat to the population.