New research has begun looking into human-bear conflict in northern B.C.
Dr. Lauren Harding of UNBC and Dr. Sarah Fessenden of Kwantlen Polytechnic University are both social scientists studying how people perceive bears, how they react to bears, and how people see conflict with bears, as well as attitudes toward bear conservation.
Their hope is to shed some light onto some differences between different communities that are having issues with human bear conflict, and how possibly policy and wildlife management can be adapted for different social contexts.
“We are conducting a study looking at some of the issues around human-bear conflict, wildlife management, and bear conservation,” said Harding. “And we’re interested in applying some of the methods that we are trained in. So qualitative methods from the social sciences, to understand more about the issue from the human side of things. We’re both anthropologists, basically trying to understand social context really well. So we’re not measuring things, we have a survey. But that’s kind of a very preliminary thing with the hope of getting more interviews.”
Along with their students, they are focusing on doing something called participant observation research, where they go out and try to get a sense of issues within a community by engaging directly with groups that are working on the issue. They are also doing semi-structured interviews.
“Our participant observation research group is the Northern Lights Wildlife Society. So we’re doing some volunteer work with them. I’m also volunteering along with another student of mine, with the Northern Bear Awareness Society in Prince George. And then we’re also doing interviews with conservation officers as well. Why we’re focusing on these groups is we’re trying to get a sense of what human-bear issues around human-bear conflict are in northern BC, from the perspective of those directly engaged with it and trying to mitigate it,” she explained.
In short, they are focused on trying to understand the lived experiences of people who are working on the issue of human-bear conflict.
“I moved to PG last year, and I used to live in Banff National Park. So I’m very familiar with bears. But I couldn’t believe how many bears were in town. And one of the wildlife biologists I spoke with when I was conceiving this project called it bear apocalypse. It was obviously, it’s a big issue,” Harding said.
“As a non-biologist what I’m trying to do is apply some of the training I have and qualitative methods and social sciences to try and understand the human dimensions of this issue. And we’re looking at it from multiple angles. We’re doing participant observations with some through volunteering, we are interviewing COs. We’re also trying to get a sense of how communities work together to try and mitigate this conflict and also support bear conservation.”
Harding said the premise is what works for managing wildlife and for reducing human-bear conflict in one community doesn’t necessarily work in another because there are different ecosystems at work, there are different community demographics at work and there are different political and cultural factors.
“Social context matters, a program to manage wildlife that’s been developed in a resort town like Whistler, doesn’t necessarily mean it is going to work in a logging town, like Mackenzie,” she said.
The group will be doing interviews and collecting data this summer, analyzing it in the fall and putting together a report over the winter.
The hope is their findings will help shape public policy and provincial programs can be adapted for local context.
They are currently looking for anyone who has donated food to the Northern Lights Wildlife Society or volunteered with the shelter in the last five years to interview. Anyone interested can email their information to hungrybearsproject@gmail.com
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