A Cochrane man whose neighbours now tease him about being famous says he’s seen enough of grizzlies for a while.
Craig Campbell was out on his normal daily walk about 10 km away from his home on the outskirts of Heritage Hills on May 2 around 10:30 am, with his 10-year-old Doberman Night, when they spotted a bear and two large cubs.
At first Campbell didn’t think it was a grizzly, since they are rarely spotted in the area.
The three bears were moving parallel to him for a bit and he wasn’t concerned.
Things changed when the agitated grizzly sow exploded out of the trees towards them.
“I had my pepper spray on my belt, but had to lift my jacket to get at it, and was convinced I wouldn’t be able to use it in time. So I thought, this can’t be happening,” he said.
“I am going to die.”
Night charged the grizzly, meeting it face-to-face, on opposite sides of a barbed wire fence, and staring at it in a silent, aggressive stance. They were about a foot apart. The grizzly was standing – Campbell estimates it was about seven feet tall.
He credits his faithful canine companion for causing enough of a distraction for him to get his pepper spray out.
But he didn’t need it, as the mama grizzly decided to retreat to her cubs.
If people on social and other media sites are getting the impression from this story that bringing dogs along in grizzly country is a good idea, bear experts would disavow them of that notion.
“The dog will go after the bear, become frightened, then run back at you, bringing the bear with it,” said Dave Klepacki, executive director of the Bragg Creek Environmental Coalition. Klepacki has spent a large portion of his career studying bear/human interactions.
“We should remind people that it is bear season. A grizzly was sighted near the West Bragg parking lot on Monday evening, by the trail,” he said.
“The males especially are on the move, and anytime now the females are coming out with the cubs and that’s an even more hazardous situation,” Klepacki said. “Keep your dog on a leash and carry bear spray.”
Bear experts always advise that dogs in bear country should be on leash. In fact, some bear behaviouralists go as far as to say hikers in bear country should leave their dogs at home – on or off leash doesn’t matter.
The issue may be that in the heat of an encounter with a grizzly, there’s no guarantee the human on the other end of the leash will remain attached as they fumble for their spray, for example.
Leaving the dog at home might not be a bad idea if hikers are going into known bear country, Klepacki said, especially until perhaps the end of July, when the sows are less aggressive and unpredictable.
Klepacki said grizzlies in the rural areas northwest of Cochrane are likely following the local elk herd, as they can prey on the calves. But that season is about a month away, so they’re likely pretty short of food these days, until more vegetation greens up.
He said he’s heard of sightings of the local elk herd in places they don’t normally frequent, like a field west of the community of Harmony. Klepacki speculated that might be because of recent construction activity around Springbank.
A man and a woman were killed by grizzlies in 2021 in the foothills northwest of Cochrane in separate incidents. It was determined different sows with cubs were involved.
Last September, two experienced hikers were killed in what experts say was likely a predatory attack by a grizzly in a remote corner of Banff National Park, also northwest of Cochrane.
