INNISFAIL – Discovery Wildlife Park deliberately solicited controversy by videotaping a young bruin’s trip to Dairy Queen for birthday ice cream as a means to grab viewers’ attention for bear safety, said zoo co-owner Doug Bos.
And in spite of widespread criticism across the country last week over the Jan. 14 video, Bos said he was pleased the Alberta government was "doing their job” in launching a probe into the incident. However, he emphasized the intent from the start was solely to underscore good conservation while staff had all safety protocols in place.
"We thought we would try doing what the media does, promote the negative stuff to get people’s attention and then give the positive message afterwards,” said Bos, whose zoo has since removed the controversial video from its Facebook site. He claimed the zoo has received "hundreds and hundreds” of positive comments since the controversial video of the Dairy Queen ice cream bear-feeding went viral on social media after being posted on the zoo’s Facebook site.
The video began with local Dairy Queen owner Mark Kemball feeding Berkley, a one-year-old Kodiak bear – a subspecies of the brown grizzly, ice cream from the drive-thru window. However, at the 21-second mark, zookeeper Serena Bos engages Kemball in a question-and-answer segment on bear safety, which included the dangers of feeding bears from inside a parked vehicle.
Nevertheless, the incident, which was reported by national news organizations, largely focused on the dangers of feeding a wild animal from a restaurant drive-thru window, and downplayed the intended conservation message. The early breaking stories also featured criticisms from Zoocheck, a Canadian-based international wildlife protection charity, as well as from Alberta-based Bear Safety & More, a well-known and respected wildlife safety company.
"I am certainly disappointed. We’ve worked for many years to try to teach people that wild animals, really of any kind, are not pets,” said Rob Laidlaw, a spokesman for Zoocheck. "You have to realize that when you are dealing with wild animals that pose any danger to human safety you have to plan for the unexpected. It may be that this bear was taken to the Dairy Queen on a chain and nothing happened. But the potential was there for something to happen.”
Serena and Doug Bos both confirmed Berkley was chained the entire time while four zoo staff members supervised the video shoot. As well, zoo staff shot the video at about 8:30 a.m. on Sunday, Jan. 14, an hour and a half before the restaurant was open for the public, a fact downplayed by the national media, or not mentioned at all.
"There was no public risk because they didn’t have any customers and weren’t open yet. If anything did go amiss we had adequate coverage,” said Bos, adding Berkley, who turned one on Jan. 17, was raised in an American zoo before being acquired by his park last year. "It was all low key. We didn’t want a crowd. We were just (promoting) the safety part of it.”
Within a day of the initial public controversy the Alberta government, through its Justice and Solicitor General ministry, announced it was launching an investigation to determine whether the Innisfail zoo had violated any provincial fish and wildlife laws.
"Public safety is a top priority for our government. The content of the video in question is very concerning,” said Brendan Cox, communications advisor for the ministry in a prepared statement. "Both Environment and Parks and the Fish and Wildlife Enforcement Branch are actively investigating this incident. The involvement of Discovery Wildlife Park in this matter is also subject to investigation.”
In the meantime, Bos said he would fully co-operate with the provincial probe. He said the park will continue to promote good conservation and bear safety but will not use the same controversial tactic.
"Right now it bothers me a lot it all went south. I don’t know where it will end up. Will we go this far again? No. We won’t do it again,” said Bos. "The only mistake I made that might have turned things out differently was not notifying fish and wildlife as to what I was going to do...so they weren’t blindsided with this whole thing.”
In the end though the widespread initial media coverage may have offered one positive, even through the storm of controversy.
"Maybe the message of good conservation did get out,” said Bos.
Doug Bos, co-owner of Discovery Wildlife Park
"The only mistake I made that might have turned things out differently was not notifying fish and wildlife as to what I was going to do, how I was going to put this message out and notify them so they weren't blindsided with this whole thing."
