A grizzly bear shot by a state wildlife official in the Yellowstone River on the morning of July 18 had been captured three times within Yellowstone National Park as part of the Interagency Grizzly Bear Study Team’s efforts.
The 15-year-old male was shot while about 4 miles north of Gardiner. For weeks it had been raiding homes, businesses, outbuildings, coolers and garbage cans in the region, seeking out human food sources. Attempts to trap the bear were unsuccessful.
Chester Evitt, who lives in the Maiden Basin area where the bear was killed, had the big bruin knock open his front door two days before it died. Evitt fired over the bear’s head several times with his handgun, scaring the bear out, but not discouraging it from raiding neighbors’ houses.
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Chester and Mary Dee Evitt say their dogs went crazy when a grizzly broke in their front door and Chester fired several shots with a Colt 1911 before it retreated. The bear was later shot by wildlife authorities.
He blamed residents and visitors who didn’t secure human foods for habituating the bear.
Longtime grizzly bear advocate, filmmaker and author Doug Peacock, who lives about a half-hour from the community of Gardiner, said state officials are “always overeager to kill rather than relocate problem bears.” He said the agency should be handing out more citations to “chronic town slackers” who leave food sources unsecured.
“Free bear-proof containers are available but those repeat garbage offenders won’t use them,” Peacock wrote in an email. “The town and wardens know who they are, but it only takes one source of edible trash to create such a problem grizzly.”
