The Abruzzo National Park has issued a statement, in which it reports that some users of social media have declared that in the winter months of 2023 they provided additional food to the pair of bears, Amarena’s children, who were orphaned due to well-known facts. The self-report would have been made, however, only now, with the protagonists pleased to have been part of the decision-making process which, according to them, would have been absolutely necessary, under penalty of the possible loss of the two animals, and an act of nothing less than ” civil disobedience”.
What attracts the attention of some”, we read in the press release, “is the lack of food resources for the Marsican bear population, in their opinion, which is why it would be necessary to proceed with supplementary feeding. If the Park decided not to proceed with supplemental feeding, it did so on the basis of comparisons and scientific research, at an international level, where in the face of some studies that praise the results, in some specific areas, many others, however, point alert to the negative effects of this practice, which effectively cancel out everything else.
And all the objective elements, collected even by researchers outside of the Park, cannot be refuted by the opinions of those who, based on empirical observations and without a scientific basis, affirm the opposite. Furthermore, how can we talk about food shortages if among all the bears we monitor or have captured, as well as all those subject to photos or videos that fill social media, there is not one that is malnourished?
The IUCN Guidelines for the reduction of conflicts with wildlife (IUCN SSC Guideline on human-wildlife conflict on 2023), when choosing a management measure, suggest that it is essential to avoid or minimize any negative side effects. Giving food to fauna is not mentioned among the suggested actions, precisely because most studies define that the risks of habituation to food and to humans, as well as the loss of mistrust and the possibility of transmitting diseases, given that where it is placed Not only bears should go for food, it actually increases conflicts.
The issue of confident bears, which we instead encounter in villages, and which therefore contributed to creating the idea of the lack of food in nature, is a phenomenon that concerns all bear populations around the world. Associating the phenomenon of confident bears with food shortages has no certain scientific basis, also because it is not clear what everyone else would live on around the central Apennines. It is not hunger that pushes some bears to periodically descend into anthropized areas, otherwise we would have dozens and dozens of bears in the villages. And this never happened. Stating that “bears come into town because they are hungry” is too simplistic an answer, which does not take into account how much more complex everything in Nature is than it seems. From this point of view, we humans should make a more careful and rational reflection because it is often precisely our simplistic approach that makes us make wrong choices with respect to the environment, with implications that we cannot even imagine. And too often we ignore the “cause and effect” relationship, because the period of time that passes before we perceive the consequences of our actions is very long.
The Park operates in a clear way, as is right for a Public Administration, and supplemental feeding is not done because it is not necessary, and indeed as already mentioned, often harmful. We work every day for a healthy nature and above all one that does not need the hand of man, certainly not for a domesticated nature. The reckless actions implemented by those who decided to artificially feed Amarena’s two bear children are extremely serious. These are clandestine actions that have little to do with respect for the law, because the Marsican bear is a particularly protected species, and on the merits of which we have asked the competent authorities to clarify and which we will give an account of as soon as we have certain information .
Furthermore, there would also be an ethical issue, as well as a scientific and regulatory one that is worth remembering: the emulation effect that others could adopt in silence and in the shadows. Reading that it was an “act of civil disobedience” is very sad and has little to do with an advanced society that has respect for the Environment in its Constitution, where respect is exactly the opposite of anarchy. We are sure that the bears would have survived the winter months even without additional food, also because it is not yet known how much this food was used, nor how much the bears actually used these and other resources. Unless the bears have been “stalked”, going well beyond the simple demonstrative gesture and significantly contributing to the phase of habituation to humans, with all the consequences that this will entail. And here another scenario opens up, if possible even more disturbing than the previous one.
Another troubling element in this story is the timing. Two bears were artificially fed in December 2023, but the story was told only a few months later, the time needed to verify that the two bears were well. The doubt that nothing would have been known about this story if something had happened to the two young bears is more than legitimate, because a correct operation should have had prior communication. It’s obvious to think that in the event of any problems with the bears there would always be the Park on which to unload any and all responsibility. In this sad story, still to be clarified, rationality, science has been lost and the bears are victims, once again, of reckless human actions, even if apparently done for their own good.”
