Their mom sprawled dead in a field in western Manitoba, all three distraught and now-orphaned cubs circled her body for hours trying to figure out why she wasn’t moving anymore.
The three cubs — two boys and one girl — are now recuperating at the Black Bear Rescue Manitoba facility near Stonewall after a poacher shot their mother and left her to die near Durban, about 10 kilometres southwest of Swan River, last Friday. The female was 15 pounds; her brothers 21 and 22 pounds.
“We were leaving for the weekend (on Friday at about 3 p.m.) and that’s when we saw the three cubs walking around the dead mama in the field,” area resident Kelli Riehl said Tuesday.
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One of three cubs recuperating at the Black Bear Rescue Manitoba facility near Stonewall after a poacher shot their mother and left her to die near Durban, about 10 kilometres southwest of Swan River, last Friday.
“My husband had the cell (number) of one of the conservation officers… so he called them direct. Thankfully, they were able to come quickly and tried to trap the cubs… I’m not against hunting, but no responsible hunter would take the life of a mother bear with three tiny cubs that were still nursing.
“Whoever did this will have to live with that shame, even if they are not caught.”
Judy Stearns, the rescue facility’s founder, said the cubs are slowly adapting to a life without their mother.
“They were still nursing and are very much missing their mother,” Stearns said.
“The cubs are highly traumatized. Their mother is their world. I wish whoever did this could come here and see what they did.”
Stearns said not only is it illegal to shoot a mother bear with cubs, it is also illegal if the shooter fired the weapon while still inside their vehicle.
She credited two conservation officers for saving the cubs.
“Thank you to conservation officers Rodney Redhead and Jeff Vermette, who went to great lengths to get the cubs to safety by setting up traps and a trail cam and eventually sedating and retrieving the cubs from a tree,” Stearns said.
“Someone shot their mom,” she said. “She was about 300 yards off of a road — it is believed she was shot from the road. They shot her and just left her. (The cubs) would have a slim chance of surviving. They were still nursing and they are susceptible to starvation and predators at this age.”
A provincial spokesman said conservation officers have determined “the mother bear had been shot from a roadway with a high-powered rifle. There is an ongoing investigation.
On Tuesday, the three bears were still adapting to the facility, which has trees for them to climb and berries from a bush to eat. A video on the facility’s social media site showed the three had fallen asleep together overnight in a large metal food bowl.
“Once quarantine is done, we will introduce them to our other cubs and they will have a big family and friends,” Stearns said.
She said the facility is now looking after a total of 14 bears, nine of them cubs and the rest yearlings.
Stearns said all of the bears — including the three young orphans — will be released into the wild in the fall.
“The cubs are five months old,” she said. “All bears are born in January and some in February.
“They usually are 16 to 17 months old when the mom chases them off right before breeding starts. If they didn’t and the big males came, they would kill them.”
Anyone with information about who shot the mother bear is encouraged to anonymously call the Turn In Poachers (TIP) line at 1-800-782-0076 or call the conservation office in Swan River at 204-734-3429.
kevin.rollason@freepress.mb.ca
Kevin Rollason
Reporter
Kevin Rollason is a general assignment reporter at the Free Press. He graduated from Western University with a Masters of Journalism in 1985 and worked at the Winnipeg Sun until 1988, when he joined the Free Press. He has served as the Free Press’s city hall and law courts reporter and has won several awards, including a National Newspaper Award. Read more about Kevin.
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