Last week, August 8/9, the Carpathia Forestry District relocated a problem bear to an isolated area, away from human settlements. Conservation Carpathia’s priority in managing wildlife is conflict avoidance. If all the preventive measures do not work, depending on the gravity of the situation, additional legal measures will be taken.

Since this spring, the inhabitants of the Valea lui Andreiaș, Valea lui Maldăr and Iaz areas, Rucăr Commune, Argeș County, were persistently disturbed by a bear that frequently attacked their households and killed livestock. The bear was carefully monitored, and the CARPATHIA wildlife rapid intervention team took different measures to cast it out, but without long-term success.

As part of human and wildlife management, the Carpathia Forestry Association, as custodian of the hunting area, made a request in April to the Ministry of the Environment for a derogation to capture and relocate this bear. At the end of July, we obtained all the legal approvals from the environmental authorities and, less than two weeks later, the bear was captured. The action took place on the night of August 8/9, in the presence of a veterinarian, whilst being coordinated by the specialist personnel of the Carpathia intervention team. After the capture, the bear was sedated and relocated to an isolated area owned by the foundation, away from human settlements. If this measure is not successful, additional measures will be taken.

“As wildlife custodians in the area, we have made and will continue to make every effort to prevent and minimize the damage caused by wildlife,” says Adrian Aldea, wildlife management biologist and Bogdan Sulică, chief of the FCC rapid response team. “We act at all points where we are notified of the presence of wild animals in the village and we take measures to remove them. In addition to the issue of bears, to keep wild boars away from gardens, we have organized various activities to cast them away from villages and, where the measures were unsuccessful, as of last season until now 23 wild boars have been extracted from private orchards, gardens and the pastures in the immediate vicinity of the villages. Conservation Carpathia granted to farmers in 2018 and 2019 more than 60 compensations, private funds, in addition to the official compensation payments given by the Ministry of Environment, and the owners agreed to improve the fencing of their properties, to stop the wild boars.

In frequently attacked areas we have installed electric fences (we have 6 at the moment) and we try to obtain financing to have more available for temporary installation in the city or at the sheepfolds in the CARPATHIA project area. We have started a breeding program of guard dogs known as ‘Ciobănesc Carpatin’, an effective defense breed against carnivores and in the next month we will donate the first dogs to the shepherds. This year we will introduce a completely new concept of private compensation in kind for the damage caused by carnivores: a local breeder of animals will raise 20 cows and 100 sheep on FCC property, livestock that will then be used to replace any eventual damages immediately.”

The development & implementation of activities to manage wildlife and wildlife conflicts is being carried out within the project “Creation of a Wilderness Reserve in the Southern Carpathian Mountains, Romania,” implemented by Foundation Conservation Carpathia,in partnership with ProPark-Foudnation for Protected Areas, Conservation Capital (U.K.), Newfoundland University (Canada), between 2019-2023, with financial support from the Arcadia Foundation through the Endangered Landscapes Program. ELP is managed by the Cambridge Conservation Initiative and funded by Arcadia.