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Loading...Pizza-Eating Bear in Whistler, B.C.
Pepperoni, ham, veggie — it is all the same to the bear who wandered into Tony’s Pizza in Whistler, B.C. The bear went straight for the pizza in the display warmer and filled up on every morsel of the tasty pies the shop had on hand.
Onlookers enjoyed the sight of the hungry bear scarfing down fatty treats. That is because the bear was busy and not threatening them. It was busy because it was hungry.
While staff tried gingerly to scare it away, the bear gobbled four pizzas. Patrons laughed and snapped photos and video footage. The video was up on YouTube but has been pulled and labeled “private.”
The sad thing is there is really nothing funny about a bear eating pizza. In ordinary times, bears would not bother to break into a pizza shop to find dinner. These are not ordinary times.
Last year’s heavy snow stayed long on the mountains, while a cold spring delayed melting. Summer heat held off until well into July, too late for a good berry crop. So British Columbia bears are on the prowl, trying to fill empty stomachs before winter sends them into hibernation.
When they stray into urban areas, they die. A bear was shot in a Prince George suburb when it hung around to eat ripe fruit. Eight bears were destroyed around Revelstoke. Two were shot in Penticton. Around Christina Lake, 17 bears were killed, some of them likely among the bears a pot grower fed so they would guard his grow-op.
Bears are paying for the havoc we wreak on the environment. Humans have squeezed them out of much of their habitat. Climate change has tampered with their berry supply. Garbage and fruit trees have to fill empty stomachs.
Black bears are most at risk, as their population is high and many live on the fringes of towns. Shooting the ones that stray too far into human neighborhoods does not put the species on the endangered list. Still, two-legged mammals create impossible situations for them, and bears pay the price.
Related Care2 Stories
Read more: animal welfare, bears, climate change, garbage, global warming
Photo from goingslo via Flickr Creative Commons
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Recent Comments from Causes
Thank you for sharing.
i am just waiting for that day when they'll stop taking women as objects!!...
Elaine, proofread your posts; your basic illiteracy is showing.
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90 comments
+ add your ownpoor bear
I love bears
Awwwww
they should only shoot with rubber bullets as a last resort if life is in danger. but they should plant some berry bushes in the mountains and any other crop that does not need tending for the bears to eat. to take the place of what was taken away from them
Please, please don't be insulting us with such lame "quick quiz" questions. Should the bear who wanders (not viciously charges but just WANDERS?!) into urban areas be shot? Just who the hell would vote "yes?" (Obviously someone too mean and heartless to be an upstanding Care2 member in the first place). Sheesh.
1) If you want to shoot a bear, use a tranquilizer gun. You don't have to kill them.
2) If you have relegated them to a certain (small) area, and it's getting near hibernation time, AND you know that they are hungry, AND you don't want them in your towns or villages, THEN find a way to feed them, so they don't come down the mountain/forest/woods to tear up your garbage, come in for pizza, or ransack your home.
3) Tell the truth, humans just want to kill every animal they see as a threat - bears, wolves, fox, cats, dogs, birds, etc. No Joke! We kill even our companion animals. We have no respect for any animal, let alone for each other. Very sad.
Let's see...humans are destroying animal habitats and then shooting them when they're forced into urban areas? What the **** are animals supposed to be doing? They are only trying to survive despite everything humans are doing wrong....
This says it all: "Bears are paying for the havoc we wreak on the environment. Humans have squeezed them out of much of their habitat. Climate change has tampered with their berry supply. Garbage and fruit trees have to fill empty stomachs."
What would YOU DO if you were these bears????????????????
There have been too many bear killings as it is..................
Shooting bears is not the answer!! I don't see why you couldn't relocate the bears.
What do they expect if they leave food out?!
It was hungry, wouldn't a hungry person do the same thing for God's sake!
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