| Annette Reuther |
TERLAGO, Italy (dpa) – The house, sandwiched between mountains and lakes and surrounded by vegetable garden, fruit trees, swings and rabbit hutches, could hardly be more idyllic.
But Moira Panazzaolo isn’t always keen to venture out into the pristine scenery.
“When it gets dark I feel like I’m in danger just two steps away from the house or taking out the rubbish,” she says.
She lives with her partner Giovanni and two small children in the village of Terlago in northern Italy – and she’s afraid of bears.
“I jump at the slightest sound. I don’t want to feel like that.”
A brown bear lumbers through forest in the Trentino region of Italy. The project Life Ursus involves reintroducing brown bears to the region, which brings fear to local folks
The project Life Ursus has been running for the past 16 years and involves reintroducing brown bears to the region.
Since the first bears were brought from Slovenia to the Adamello-Brenta nature park, the population has increased to 50 bears.
One of them caused a diplomatic incident in 2006 when he wandered all the way to Germany. Bruno was subsequently shot as a menace and his stuffed body displayed in a museum. The incensed Italians demanded his return.
Other bears in the region are now showing the same aggressive tendencies as Bruno.
In June a female brown bear known as KJ2 – who is still being searched for – mauled a jogger, seriously injuring him.
Last year, a mother bear, Danize, attacked a mushroom picker. The bear failed to wake up from the anaesthetic that was given to her during her capture.
The events have only served to further strain relations between man and beast.
“Even though I know I’m statistically more likely to get run over by a car than be eaten by a bear, I’m still scared,” says Panazzolo.
Moira Panazzolo (right) and her partner Giovanni in the garden of their house in Terlago. PHOTOS: DPA
The problem has been recognised by the authorities.
“At the beginning, support for the reintroduction (of bears) was much greater. Now the contra party is greater. Lots of people are afraid of the bear. That’s a problem,” says Claudio Groff, who’s responsible for bears in the autonomous province of Trient.
Communication with the locals has to improve, he says.
Bureaucracy between the Environment Ministry in Rome – which is in overall charge of the reintroduction programme – and the province slows any reaction to “problem bears,” the term used by European officials for individual animals that lose their fear of humans and begin attacking sheep and people.
Protection measures are also often ineffective. Tests on electric fences, for example, showed that many of them didn’t work properly.
The state parliament in Trentino recently decided that the bear population should be reduced. The far-right Lega Nord party, which is strong in northern Italy, has also demanded a referendum to show how many people are for and against the bears.
“We already know that the majority of people are against the bears. So a referendum would be completely superfluous,” says Groff.
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