Letter: Bear shot by local resident

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. - A sad event happened over the recent holiday weekend. A long-time local resident shot a bear in his kitchen, feeling his and his dog's safety was being threatened after the sub-adult bear entered his house through a door to the fenced backyard. Even more sad is the first news of this event that many people saw was a social media post filled with passion and pitchforks, but sans the actual facts of what happened.

The very first thing the resident did afterward was to call 911, and within 15 minutes an El Dorado County Sheriff's Deputy arrived, followed soon after by a California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) game warden, to investigate the incident.

Human-bear conflict issues are on the rise both here in the Lake Tahoe Basin, and in many other parts of California, and the greater United States.

Recently through a pathological forensic investigation, it was learned that the very first human ever killed by a black bear in the history of the State of California took place last Fall. Here on the South Shore over the last couple of years, there have been close to half a dozen human-bear physical interactions inside homes resulting in non-life threatening injuries, none of which made it into the press. I think it is safe to say none of these people involved actively and knowingly invited these situations to happen as some folks would suggest. Just last week in Arizona a black bear quietly entered a summer cabin, unbeknownst to the 15-year-old who was watching YouTube at the time. The bear swiped the teenager across his face from behind twice.

Human-bear conflict issues are both increasing in number and severity of behavior. To be sure, there is absolutely no malice on the part of the bears in these situations, but regardless of what anyone says, black bears have the potential to be very dangerous in close quarters. It's more important now than it has ever been for the community members to work together with both CDFW and the Nevada Department of Wildlife to mitigate these escalating human-bear conflict issues.

Creating division helps no one, so let's all get on the same page and work together!

- Toogee Sielsch
South Lake Tahoe