Bear culling in Trentino: Piero Genovesi from Ispra replies to Maurizio Fugatti

The president of the Autonomous Province of Trento, Maurizio Fugatti, attributed the responsibility for the failure to kill the bear JJ4, which killed Andrea Papi, to Ispra (Higher Institute for Environmental Protection and Research). For Fugatti, “the Institute knew of the problematic behavior of the bear JJ4” but did not consider it dangerous. Piero Genoesehead of the Wildlife Coordination Service and world-renowned bear researcher, responded to the president’s comments.

Is it true, as Fugatti says, that you have blocked the felling?
“No, it was the TAR, as we also learn today. We have made a series of technical assessments, always taking into account the guidelines of the Pacobace, an instrument agreed between the Regions, the Autonomous Provinces and the Ministry and a guide document for evaluate bear behavior In the case of JJ4, when there was the first attack on June 22, 2020, the Autonomous Province of Trento issued a culling order without requesting our evaluation, which was then commissioned by the Ministry of the Environment When the TAR expressed itself, we had not yet spoken”.

Is it true that in your report, as Fugatti states, you assessed that the behavior of bear JJ4 was not such as to justify the slaughter?
“Our assessment followed the scientific criteria of Pacobace, which identifies a series of behaviors and possible measures, weighted by the territorial competent body, which in that case is the Province. Specifically, the first attack of JJ4 falls into category 15 ( 18 is the most dangerous grade ed) of the Pacobace table, i.e. ‘bear attacks with physical contact to defend its own cubs, its prey or because it is provoked’. In that case, the measures envisaged by Pacobace also provide for the removal or killing, but also ‘the intensification of monitoring’ (in the case of a radio-collared bear). We assessed that JJ4 had never exhibited dangerous behavior before and there was a triggering factor, the presence of puppies, for which we recommended radio collaring. On the contrary, in the case of MJ5, which attacked a man on March 5 in Val di Rabbi, we evaluated differently”.

THE PACOBACE TABLE

Has the Province provided a radio collar for JJ4?
“The collar is broken. It should be clarified that in any case monitoring is important and should be done as much as possible, but it does not prevent all risks. Sometimes there is a delay in data transmission, but it allows for better management because it allows locating the bear, find it, know in which areas it moves and therefore, in general, get to know the context better”. and better understand the context. however order suspended by Tar.

After this first evaluation, what was the behavior of JJ4?
“He has shown no dangerous behavior, other than two false attacks in 2022.”

What are fake attacks?

“It is a typical behavior in bears, it means that when they feel disturbed by someone they make a charge, but stop at a short distance, they don’t make contact. They do it very frequently to intimidate the source of disturbance. In Pacobace this behavior is not provides for the removal and even less the slaughter”.

Could these repeated false attacks by JJ4 make her be defined as a “fearful bear”, or is attributing an emotional characteristic an anthropomorphization wrong?
“Bears more than other animals have different individual behaviors from individual to individual, which must be considered with their history in mind. False attacks can be considered an indication of behavior that is becoming less elusive and in the case of JJ4 we have highlighted this in the However, I repeat that in 2022, when we were asked for an evaluation by the Province, we wrote that considering that for 15 months it had not shown aggressive behavior and that it had cubs again, (bears have one litter every year and one no ed) we did not recommend the removal but the replacement of the collar. the province had also proposed us an experimental way, sterilization and we expressed ourselves in a favorable way given that the problematic nature of the bear manifested itself with the litter”.

Does JJ4’s genealogy say anything about his problematic nature?
“In Trentino we have detailed information on practically every specimen. JJ4 is the sister of Bruno, shot down in Germany, and JJ3 shot down in Switzerland. Behaviors in bears actually depend on learning from cubs and it is not uncommon for families to show similar behaviors and there are problematic animals in the same litter. However, I repeat that JJ4 in 14 years had never given problems, up to the litter. It is one of the elements considered to suggest the radio collar or sterilisation”.

Has the Province followed your suggestions?
“It was not possible to replace the collar because the captures were suspended because in the meantime the bear FF43 had died following anesthesia and investigations were underway on the procedures. It must be said that sterilization is not foreseen by the Pacobace, but since we had consulted in In this regard, international experts from the IUCN, who deem it useful, we had given a favorable opinion on the experimentation, but for a series of factors, the Province did not go ahead”.

Why
“Decisions on bear management depend on an overall assessment of many factors, technical, social, political. For example, we at Ispra always recommend telemetric monitoring, but we know that it is demanding for institutions because it is expensive, and requires dedicated personnel In this sense, the decision of how many animals to equip with a radio collar therefore depends on an evaluation of the economic resources and other things that we cannot enter in. We are asked to make an objective and independent evaluation that we provide with the utmost rigor and in the shortest possible time , the decisions on how to use the evaluations do not depend on us. I also stress that we respond in a very short time: in the case of MJ5, which we evaluated as dangerous to the highest degree of Pacobace, we received the documentation to work on in two tranches after the attack of March 5: we had the first part available on March 27 and the last on April 5. We expressed ourselves on April 6, anticipating the complete report, the opinion in favor of the demolition with an official document from the Province had the first possible day, i.e. April 11”.