Bears in Anchorage: What to do with big, wild life?

For those who live in the Last Frontier, we like it wild.  But as the population of Alaska grows, so does our clash with the wild.  Bears have become an increasing problem in Anchorage, and with recent attacks and encounters, people are wondering what we ought to do.  As we encroach on big, wild life, different options of handling the issue have arisen.

An Anchorage gun dealer informs bear-wary buyers, “Wherever there is dirt, it is bear territory, and the concrete areas probably have bears too.”  For many people, killing unwanted bears is a solid solution.  After unprovoked “city bears” attack joggers and bicyclists last year, and when bears were struck by cars in our business district, it makes sense to lean towards capital punishment of potential problem-makers.  The issue then becomes determining which bears are or are not potential problems.  With tempting trash cans and pets around, who can blame a hungry bear?  And who can blame a dad for wearing a .44 when riding bikes with his kids?

Another way of handling the issue is to be proactive.  While schools and neighborhoods have informed people about bear activity and how to respond to potential threats, the city of Anchorage has recently hired a wildlife specialist to deal with problem bears. This first-time position with the city was created in response to the series of attacks last summer; the goal of the wildlife specialist is to prevent all inappropriate relationships between wildlife and humans.  We will see how effective this solution turns out.

One less popular way of dealing with the bear situation is cohabiting with bears peacefully.  Strange as it sounds, it has been done … sort of.  Charles Vandergaw has has lived with wild grizzly and black bears at his cabin just North of Anchorage for 20 years, offering them cookies and dog food in exchange for friendship.  

Vandergaw became a sensation this April when he was featured in Animal Planet’s “Stranger among Bears”.  For 51 days a filmographer lived at the isolated cabin with him, documenting his spectacular life with bears.  Each episode shows Vandergaw hand-feeding wild bears, petting them, and lazing around with them in the sun, touching hand to paw.  Wherever Vandergaw walked with his blue bucket of food, a dozen bears followed. 

Many Alaskans hear this and immediately think of Timothy Treadwell, the Californian bar-tender who spent 14 summers living among bears in Katmai, but was finally eaten by the bears he thought befriended him. Vandergaw says he is not remotely similar to Treadwell,  “I’ve tried hard not to invade the bear’s space,” he says. “They are coming in here and entering my space.”  He does admit that by feeding the bears he has created something unnatural, but he says he is obsessed with touching the bears.  “I’ve created a fairyland here. This is not the real world … they’re comfortable with other humans here.” 

Bear biologists believe he is sitting on a time bomb (or feeding one), and his actions are not safe for the bears or for other humans. They feel he has habituated the bears, so that people equal food.  If the food is not present, though, the bears may leave, rummage, or attack. Despite the professional input, Vandergaw still believes bears and human can cohabit peacefully.  This he says while carrying his blue bucket of peace offerings.

By feeding the bears on a consistent basis he intends to prove they are not as threatening as people believe.  And after 20 years, he has made some believers.  But skeptics want to know if he’s ever been attacked by his “friends”.  Vandergaw said, “I’ve been slapped. I’ve been knocked unconscious. I’ve been T-boned by large bears and had a hard time getting up … in no way any of those was an all-out attack.”  Even during the Animal Planet filming, both he and the filmographer were bitten.  The very bear he believed had made the most progress bit through his hand, jerked him off his feet, and slammed him to the ground.  He took himself to the hospital to be stitched and treated.  Just as beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so the definition of “attack” is in the eye of the victim.

Biologists disagree with Vandergaw’s theories.  By habituating wild bears with human food, he can pretend wild animals are his pets, but when the food runs dry, the friendship is over.  State troopers also disagree with Vandergaw’s methods and have charged him with 20 misdemeanor counts of illegally feeding bears.  This proves that it’s never good to do illegal activities under your real name on national television.

Though the opinions vary as to how Alaskans and legislation ought to deal with the increasing bear encounters and attacks, it is safe to guess that Vandergaw’s idea of peaceful cohabitation with dangerous wildlife is not going to win out.  What would be next?  Mosquito whispering?