after almost two months, a document shrouded in myths called “Manual for protective shooting of the brown bear” saw the light of day. I will try to bring you closer to the content of that work, which was the subject of several press conferences of the management of the environmental department, in the following lines.
key words of the manual
The most frequently used term, apart from the word “bear” (75), seems to be “risk”, which appears in various forms up to 54 times in the document. The authors used the words “elimination” (25), “shooting” (8) or “death” (7) of the bear 40 times. The term “danger” is often used. In various forms, you will find it 21 times in the document. The authors used the word “threat” 10 times. The authors of the manual thought about the “safety of residents” 4 times. In this context, “protecting the health and life of residents” also appears 4 more times in the document. The phrase “precautionary measures” occurs exactly 4 times in the manual.
“Frightening” or “pushing” the bear out of the inner city also appears 4 times (2+2) in the document. The word “capture” appeared 1 time in the manual, specifically in the context of possible capture of cubs after killing a bear. You will NOT find the word “protection” in connection with the bear as a protected species of European significance in the manual even once, despite the fact that the manual was issued by the central state administration body in the nature and landscape protection department (MŽP SR).
the manual consists of 17 pages and does not contain any attachments.
The 1st page consists of the cover of the manual.
The 2nd page consists of the content of the document.
The 3rd page is dedicated to the list of used abbreviations. You will also learn, for example, that SR is an abbreviation for the Slovak Republic.
The 4th page presents a list of legal regulations, but you will not learn anything about them in the document itself.
What is the point of stating that the legislative basis of the manual is Council Directive no. 92/43/EEC on the protection of natural habitats, wild animals and wild plants, if its authors do not even mention that this directive stipulates that the killing of a protected animal (including a bear) can only be done if there is no other economically and a technically feasible alternative?
The 5th page is focused on explaining the terms used, while the authors of the manual somehow forgot about those that really deserve an explanation (e.g. problem individual, synanthropic individual, intervention, attractant, etc.).
The manual also warns the reader that “when a person enters the space of a female with cubs” a dangerous situation arises. Did the authors not try to artificially increase the scope of the document by using generally known facts?
The 6th page motivates every reader to boundless curiosity. You will not find the list of “risk areas”, which the authors define in this part of the manual in 4 lines, anywhere.
The list of risk areas was annex no. 1 of the working version of the manual (version 2), while the authors also considered Tatranská Lomnica and Liptovský Hrádok as risk areas, from which the intervention team received only 5 reports of bear sightings in 2023 (10 reports in total).
You will also learn that “the occurrence of an individual brown bear in the early spring period (March, April) is due to the search for easily available food near people after hibernation (bee hives, garbage cans)”.
Taking into account the impressive sentence structure of the authors, the question is forming in me, can bears look for easily available food even near people who are not hibernating?
Isn’t readily available high-energy food the reason why bears appear near humans in other calendar months than March and April mentioned by the authors?
The 7th page reports on the establishment of an operations center for “streamlining risk reporting”. And although we have already learned the telephone number (18,081), the estimated costs for the establishment and operation of the operation center remain uncalculated.
We also do not learn from the manual why the emergency call number 112 cannot be used to report the occurrence of a bear, as was officially agreed some time ago with the crisis management section of the Ministry of the Interior of the Slovak Republic.
The 8th party deals with the receipt and registration of reports.
Although the authors of the manual declare that “during the interview with the operator, the whistleblower must answer several standardized questions that help the operator evaluate the situation”, the manual itself does not contain any standardized questions for hazard assessment.
Namely, asking the whistleblower’s first and last name is not a standardized question that can be used to assess the level of danger. If the operator asked “Was there a human injury?” or “Is the bear still there?”, that would be a different story. The basis should be questions to which the informant can answer YES or NO.
The manual also states that the operator follows “Risk Assessment and Risk Categorization”, but the manual DOESN’T contain anything like that.
Page 9 sets out two working procedures:
“Procedure after reporting a recorded occurrence of a brown bear in an intravillage” consists of 8 bullet points containing general phrases without establishing clear rules.
Although the authors write that after reporting the occurrence of a bear, there should be an inspection of the site aimed at verifying the current situation, but they do not at all specify the time period in which such an inspection must be carried out (e.g. max. within 48 hours of receiving the report).
By the way, if the authors use the phrase “reporting a recorded occurrence”, citizens can also report an unrecorded occurrence.
“Procedure after reporting the current occurrence of a brown bear in an intravillage” also consists of 8 bullet points.
However, these only determine who the operations center (which doesn’t actually exist yet) should contact after reporting a bear in the inner city. You will not learn anything more in subsection 6.2.
The 10th page sets out the tasks and duties of the intervention commander.
An interesting contradiction in this context are several tasks, the fulfillment of which clearly requires the presence of the intervention commander at the site of the intervention, while on page 13 we learn that “the executor can only proceed to kill an identified problematic individual of a brown bear by blasting on the basis of a direct instruction from the intervention commander in the event that he is directly involved in the firing, or on the basis of a demonstrable instruction from the intervention commander in the form of an SMS or email”.
The intervention commander, who, according to the manual, is on the one hand responsible for coordinating the armed and rescue services at the intervention site, can, on the other hand, issue an instruction to shoot the bear via SMS from his living room.
The 11th page determines the roles of both the Police Force and the user of the hunting grounds.
According to the manual, the task of the hunters is to “send a person on the trip who, if necessary, will be able to ensure the elimination of a synanthropic brown bear” and familiarize this person with the contents of the manual.
I can already see how the hunter is studying your manual during the transfer to the place of intervention, Mr. Minister.
The 12th page determines the duties of the local government representative.
However, if you thought that this manual would encourage mayors and mayors, e.g. to keep the public space clean or to keep the garbage away from the bear, you will be disappointed. After all, this is a manual for shooting bears, not a manual for a comprehensive solution to the problem
The manual also contains a list of the necessary technical equipment for intervention. However, you would search it in vain for e.g. such an “unnecessary” first aid bag or protective equipment for intervention participants (bear spray, trapping gloves, etc.).
The 13th page finally deals with what the authors thought was most important – the elimination of the bear.
Right at the beginning, you will hear the generalized statement that “a bear that has been shot tries to attack the shooter”. Thus, the authors themselves admit the great risk of such interventions in the inner city.
During my time in the Intervention Team, we always eliminated the bear with regard to the safety of the participants in the intervention, as well as the local residents. We used special trapping devices, in which we then put the bear to sleep and euthanize it painlessly in the presence of a wind doctor. As if the authors of the manual did not want to accept the fact that a bear caught in a trap is safely isolated from people, while a shot bear is a serious risk for everyone present.
There is no point in commenting on the other chapters of the document, which deal with a kind of crisis team, principles of communication and confidentiality.
final rating
After studying the manual, I dare to state that the document issued by the ministry is a failed stylistic work that will not bring any positive effect in solving the bear problem in Slovakia, which is perhaps also realized by its authors, who were ashamed to even sign under this work.
See also:
You can find the entire manual at this link.
The SNS environmental nominees have still not shown a manual on how they want to shoot protected bears.
Hunters will become “nature managers”. Taraba wants to shoot bears directly in the villages, bypassing the deputies.
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