THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, January 11, 1997 TAG: 9701110270
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B5 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY LINDA McNATT, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: SUFFOLK LENGTH: 44 lines
An investigation into the death of a black bear in a snare trap last fall on the edge of the Great Dismal Swamp showed no negligence by department employees, a spokesman for the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries said Friday.
The decomposed bear, found in late November in the trap on farmland at the edge of the Great Dismal Swamp National Wildlife Refuge, had created a trench around a tree to which it was attached, said George Jernigan, a friend of the landowner who saw the carcass before it was hauled away.
``He died a horrible death,'' said Jernigan, of Portsmouth. ``He starved to death and thirsted to death.''
Glen Askins, regional wildlife manager for the game commission, said the trap may not have been one used by the department to trap bears slated to be moved to the mountains of western Virginia.
``The investigation we completed is just not conclusive about who put the trap there,'' Askins said. ``Our staff was able to account for all of their traps.''
He said, ``They had set several traps on the farm, but diaries they kept accounted for all of those traps. We found that a couple of traps had been tampered with, and the investigation is still going on.''
Records also indicated that, as required by Virginia law, the traps set by game commission employees were checked at least once - sometimes twice - daily. All of the bears moved from the area had been reported for crop damage, Askins said.
``Bears can cost a farmer thousands of dollars in damage in just a week's time,'' he said. ``Our staff members made a tremendous effort to trap and move the bears rather than kill them. Our department has handled about 700 bears in the last couple of years with no bodily harm to the animals. This was an unfortunate incident.''
The traps used by the game commission employees, Askins said, can be purchased commercially. And, until the dead bear was found, the commission did not have a policy of marking traps for identification purposes.
``I think we will change our procedure on how traps are handled,'' he said. ``We plan to put specific game department markings on traps from now on.''
KEYWORDS: BEAR DISMAL SWAMP