Residential encroachment in a suburb north of Toronto, Canada into bear country had some predictable results yesterday.

A black bear was wondering a neighbourhood, and was treed by local police. Police tried the Ministry of Natural Resources, the Toronto Zoo, the Humane Society and a couple others to secure a tranquilizer gun with no luck.

When the bear started back down the tree, the police opened fire killing the bear. Public reaction has not been kind.

Police shoot bear in town north of Toronto

Twitter has lit up with helpful suggestions of how the police could have 'subdued' the bear without injuring it. Only here could you seriously ask police to consider improvising with ropes and blankets to try and capture a wild animal. Because let's face it: one little frightened bear wouldn't have injured anybody in a suburban neighbourhood at 8:00am half a kilometre from an elementary school - would it?

Where on a bear is his "York Region"?

The news story lacks pertinent details.

I read the whole article and didn't see a word about anybody making bear sausage or a rug.

Bears routinely pass through N Atlanta suburbs in the spring. Don't recall the boys in blue feeling the need to shoot them.

Just south of his "nether region"?

People don't realize how strong animals are. Even small ones. A 50# chimp can easily rip a man's arm off without breaking a sweat. At 80# they are about as strong as 10 men. Then there are those cute 200# baby bears. Yea I too would like to have seen it tranquilized and let out somewhere safe. I am veey much a live and let live individual. Dont even care for hunting. But having the bear run around frightened in a residential neighborhood is also not good. One swipe from that little paw is all it takes

I once saw a newspaper article about a shooting. The headline read, "Woman shot after a lovers quarrel. The bullet is in her yet." I know my way around women, but I've never seen a "yet".

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Don Mundell

Inspiring? Possibly aspiring, but now expiring.

I live in a medium large city (~ 1million in area) and we have seven black bears that frequent the neighborhood according to DoW. They have been here for the 20 years I've been here and there has never been a problem with them. People keep their trash secure, bird feeders out of reach, and no pet food or other things for them to get into. But, I guess our government is smarter when it comes to wildlife, They don't go around playing big guy and shooting up the coyotes, bobcats, bears, deer, and any other critter that happens to pass through. Maybe we're smarter around here.

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That was just a cover story released to the media. It was obviously another case of a rogue Sasquatch seeking a mate that had to be put down. At least one Mountie is at the local fire station, wrapped in a blanket, sobbing...while he uses a GI Joe and a Chewbacca figure to reenact what happened.

The problem is the results should not have been predictable, unless their police department is staffed by a bunch of trigger happy yahoos.

Why would a well-equipped police department in a location where bear sightings and encounters might be expected not have a tranquilizer gun? Bet they have a good bit of military style weapons, though.

Gosh, I can't imagine why. Just because police open fire on a black bear in someone's back yard is no reason for the public to be upset. I mean, just because it's in a neighborhood where people might be around watching...guess it's S.O.P. for the cops to fire off a few high powered rounds no matter what the circumstances.

I'll bet money (good ol' American dollars) police posed for cell phone photos with the dead bear, too. Probably bragging about their kill over a few cold ones after work.

Probably not. The bear was probably more frightened than any of the humans...that's why it went up the tree. If left alone, most wandering bears just amble on back to where they came from, unless someone's just stupid enough to mess with it.

We have quite a few black bear sightings around here, along with bears wandering through neighborhoods, especially in the spring. They knock over a few trash cans, people make photographs and videos of the bear, then the bear goes back to wherever it came from. The cops might show up, but I don't recall any bears getting shot.

The cops should have subdued the bear and threw him into a paddy wagon without seat belts and given him "The Ride."

We are Done..

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SWCA #2306
DAV in honor of POP