Hunting bears in Siberia: the massacre
ASHAMED MASSACRE
Leading article Aves France of the Thursday, March 26, 2009 by Sylvie Cardona.
The word massacre is not too extremely indeed for designer this practice of hunting. How to differently qualify an act which consists in practically blowing away with end carrying a bear that one leaves force of its den ? It is however what occurs to Siberia.
It is a article published in VSD which drew our attention. The subject is not new, but the fact that it is a French magazine as VSD which relays information was interesting. Passed the first start of indignation, I said myself that this paper was a good thing. For once, one will not be able to say that associations exaggerate and deform the facts. Photographs and texts are sufficiently eloquent here. Therefore, for the unhealthy pleasure of fortunate types, one tracks the brown bear in period of hibernation, one smokes out his den and one cuts down it without another form of lawsuit. When it is a female which is killed, the bear cubs remain orphan. Either they die of hunger, or they are recovered to be sold with zoos or with circuses.
The global population of brown bears goes rather well. But since 1995, one attends a regular fall of manpower. In addition, many populations of brown bears are over-estimated to be able to be driven out. A juicy market that many tour operators and agencies divide themselves specialized. An example : The founder of AVES Romania (since deceased) denounced scandalous practices of hunting (it was in particular about hunting for the soft food) on the brown bears whose manpower were largely over-estimated. But this activity paying of the currencies, nobody had interest to protect the bear in this country.
In August 2008, about twenty famished brown bears, in search of food in the inhabited areas, were cut down in the Siberian area of Krasnoïarski. (source : the news agency Itar-Heap). a case which is not isolated.
In 2007, I had written an article on the situation of the bears in Kamtchatka.
Vis-a-vis the explosion of hunting for the trophies, to protect the cores from brown bears in Europe thus remains paramount…
PUBLISHED ARTICLE
Here the copy of the article published on VSD.fr written by Andrei Rudakov and Antoine Dreyfus. Report published in "VSD n°1647" (of the from March 18th to 24th 2009).
The motoneiges engage between the fir trees, by avoiding the branches weighed down by the mass of snow. The small ration of swallowed vodka dry bottom the imp heats the stomach for a few minutes, but is not enough to make go up the temperature in this area in the neighborhoods of Krasnoïarsk. It makes easily less 40°C in this lost corner of Siberia. The group of hunters must still avoid holes, uneven, rocks, ruts and traps impossible to locate. On the base camp, for a few days, of the local pickups have traversed the taiga in search of brown bears. The winter, these massive plantigrades, of the same family as those which were reintroduced in the Pyrenees, hibernate of long weeks, while having stored sufficient grease to support the cold. The pickups are hard Siberian trappers, broken at the extreme, expert temperatures in the wild life, fauna and the flora. They very prepared for the hunters : the camp, sites of hunting, food and vodka. The customers hunters will have only to tolerate the low temperatures and at the proper time to aim.
A FISH POND ESTIMATES OF 14 000 TO 30 000 PLANTIGRADES
Fall of Communism, capitalism unslung and proliferation of the wild species, Siberia became a vast playing field for the rich person in evil of feelings which come to shoot at the king from the animals from this part of the world. Impossible to say how much men come to face the brown bear in a virile environment, but these forwardings are in full expansion. A specialized Belgian agency ensures to organize twenty-five to thirty voyages per annum, by groups of three to four people each time. With 8 500 euros minimum the tour of eight or nine days, to say as much that it is about a flourishing business. "The money makes all the difference, confesses the Belgian official of this company, which wishes to keep anonymity. People having the means are in search of strong feelings. In fact necessarily hunters want a trophy prestigious. Certain fortunate customers do not even draw and let the guides cut down them in their place". In France, at least three agencies were placed on the crenel of these safaris. In Russia, it is the explosion. Tens of companies promise the excitation of the wild life to you. An environment of "far east" where, practically, all is allowed. The more so as contrary to France or Spain where it is protected, the prosperous brown bear in the Russian steppes and the taiga.
The figures vary according to the sources : enter 14 000 and 30 000 individuals. Each year, the Russian State thus delivers quotas of hunting which vary according to the areas. This time, the group followed by Andrei Rudakov, a Russian photographer, understands two Russians, a Pole and a guide of hunting. The hunters spent approximately 5 000 euros to have the right to kill a brown bear. The tracking and hunting itself last only two days. Once located, the animals, deeply deadened in their den, must be dislodged. The pickups start by titillating them with sticks to awake them. "But that is not enough. The bear thunders, but does not leave" explains the photographer.
They proceed then at the following stage : to smoke out its den. And there, the animal has of another solution only to open the eyes, to move and thunder with the firm intention to go to crunch these intruders. To 3 or 4 meters of the entry of the hiding place of the plantigrade, are held posted the three hunters, provided with single-barrelled guns. "It is necessary to draw to him above when it rose to half and it is necessary to draw simultaneously. If not, you take the risk to see melting on you a mad animal of more than 400 kilos and 3 meters in height". The shooting is thus very short. And charged with adrenalin.
THE MARK OF THE MEN
The lying animal in snow, it is then the festival for the hunters, charmed to have escaped with the claws of the wild mammal… Then they plunge the hand in the body, take blood with their fingers and mark the face. "It is an immutable ritual, tells the photographer. That wants to say that you return in the closed circle of the hunters of bear. You are a man, to some extent". To bring back the animal to the village, the hired men lay out it on an especially arranged sledge. It is also for that this kind of hunting takes place the winter. The summer, it would be almost impossible to transport such masses.
At the village, to celebrate the event, the hunters are released then in merry drinkings. If they discharged taxes necessary, they will set out again on their premises with their skin of bear, which will finish in bedside rug, irrefutable proof of their "exploit". Only difficulty : if they kill a female, the possible bear cubs will be abandoned, a practice denounced by defense associations of the animals. The fortunate hunters, as for them, think to enter the history. They killed a brown bear. They defied the gods.
See on line : the article of VSD (in French).
VIDEO
To conclude this article, I propose to you to look at the band announces of a famous film of Jean-Jacques Annaud : The Bear. This film tells the history of a small orphan bear cub whose mother is prematurely deceased. The chance will make him meet a he-bear which will take it under its wing in order to teach him the rudiment from the life and its dangers. A beautiful lesson of humility, where the man learns that the bear can know pity.
Large a thank you with Jean-Jacques Annaud
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