A group of young people filmed and followed a bear in Trentino. The images show two boys, filmed in turn by a third party, as they illuminate a bear moving among the trees with their phone flashlight and in the meantime film it. When the bear moves away, disturbed by the lights and the presence of people, the small group follows him.
The video was released by the satirical page “Welcome to Trento” on Instagram and also commented on by animal rights associations who denounced the danger of such behavior both for the protection of wild fauna and for the safety of the young people themselves. «Our legal office is already preparing a complaint to call the boys involved in the video to their responsibilities – he declared Massimo Vitturiresponsible WORK Wild Animals – what headlines would we be reading in the newspapers today, what words of hatred would come out of Fugatti’s mouth today or from some citizens’ committee if that bear had reacted to what were some serious provocations? It is no longer tolerable that animals always pay the price, it’s time for people to take responsibility for any interactions with bears!
If the bear had felt threatened by the close presence of people, it could have staged a false attack or, in the most serious case, chased them in turn and injured them. The young people could have caused serious damage to themselves and at the same time condemned the animal to death.
With a note released just yesterday, the Autonomous Province of Trento he underlined how «regardless of the more or less correct behavior of those who find themselves experiencing these particular encounters» there are some cases which require the removal of the animal.
The Province’s reference referred to two recent cases. In particular the episode in which he was the protagonist M91, a young individual born in 2022, who followed a hiker upstream from Molveno last April and was subsequently radio-collared for this. His fate may be the same as M90killed by a flash attack signed by the Trentino president Maurizio Fugatti. The bear had followed a couple of hikers along a forest road near the municipality of Mezzana, in Val di Sole, and was killed for this reason.
