in the mountains When weddings take place in villages in northern Italy, friends often paint the names of the happy couple on sheets and hang them near the main road. A similar sheet now hangs above the roundabout in the small town of Caldes in Trentino, but only one with her name. Andrew.always togetherThe message, “Andrea. Always together,” is accompanied by a single spray-painted heart.
It’s been two weeks since Andrea Papi’s body was found in the woods near his hometown. A 26-year-old trail running enthusiast was killed by a bear while training. His death was the first fatal bear attack in modern Western Europe and sparked fierce debate both inside and outside Trentino. It has drawn the attention of individuals and state wildlife departments. Without the rewilding program 25 years ago, the bears wouldn’t be there.
By the mid-1990s, brown bears (Ursus Arctos) were functionally extinct in the Alps. The few remaining animals inhabiting Trentino were too few to breed. However, from 1996 to 2004, two of his EU-funded projects, called LIFE Ursus I and II, reversed this decline and saved species that play an important environmental role in the region. I set out for Bears are ecological engineers. They clean up carcasses, strip the bark of trees, and scatter the seeds of plants and berries with their droppings. Controlling populations of deer and other prey species also allows certain plants to thrive, providing habitat for species further down the food chain and improving biodiversity.
During the course of the LIFE Ursus project, 10 animals were captured in Slovenia and released into the state. This population is carefully monitored and managed, and there are now over 100 of him in Trentino. When launched, the initiative was extremely popular, with surveys showing him 75% public support. With emotions running high after Papi’s death, years of painstaking scientific research could be undone.
Claudio Groff, head of the Trentino Wildlife Department’s Large Carnivore Division and one of the authors of the original feasibility report on which the LIFE Ursus project was based, said: According to a survey conducted during the course of the project, public opinion had already turned unfavorable to the existence of bears. No matter what, it will be the whole bear that will pay the price,” says Groff.
The initial reaction from politicians in Trentino seemed to confirm his worst fears. He said he wanted to kill or deport 50 of them, in addition to killing a 17-year-old female with a baby. to 70 other animals. This, he claims, will bring the population down to manageable levels.
According to various experts, including Groff and Paolo Pedrini, heads of the vertebrate biology unit at MUSE, a natural history museum in Trentino, the scientifically clear solution is to kill the 70 bears. But even if it didn’t happen, scientists admit that the fragile public consensus on which the rewilding program was based was shaken, if not completely shattered. There is
“If you look at Facebook and newspapers, there is a very strong anti-bear reaction,” says Pedrini. It will fall under any circumstances. Both are useless, he believes, and the danger is that both sides will go against the expert best placed to propose a solution.
“There needs to be better communication as to why the project was started in the first place,” says Marco Salvatori, who runs MUSE’s bear-monitoring project in collaboration with the Wildlife Department of Trentino. “There is a lack of knowledge on many levels in Italy about conservation in general and the biodiversity crisis in particular.” he says he needs to get Since the animals have returned to Trentino relatively recently, many people in the state are aware of basic bear safety protocols (common practices in countries such as the United States and Canada). Is not …
“The state government has physically reintroduced bears, not culturally,” said Massimo Vitturi, head of wildlife at animal rights group LAV. (Established in 1977 as a coalition against vivisection and now campaigns on a range of related issues.) “In a country where bears have never disappeared, this knowledge is the is passed down from father to son,” he says. “In Canada, we teach elementary school kids how to use bear spray. Obviously, we use plastic bears and water splashers.” I never grew up with bears, so I know very little about dealing with bears.
States invest heavily in measures to prevent conflict. Every year, Claudio Grof’s Wildlife Department makes payments to farmers to compensate for the death of livestock and damage to crops and beehives caused by animals. In 2021, the latest year for which figures are available, he paid €172,000 ($190,000) to cover 301 individual incidents. “We try to pay quickly. We pay everyone within two months,” he says, Groff. There are also subsidies for guard dogs and electric fences. In 2021, the Wildlife Service spent her just over €130,000 on preventative measures.
But according to LAV’s Vitturi, those amounts pale in comparison to what is needed. He puts the blame for the current situation squarely at the door of Trentino politicians, accusing them of not paying enough attention to the issue over the years. believes that better communication with the public is a key issue, and hopes to initiate large-scale public education projects aimed at reducing sources of conflict and promoting coexistence. “They should have started it five years ago,” he says. The problem is that such initiatives are undoubtedly costly, and even he believes it would be difficult to convince the general public to fund a program that could be portrayed as “pro-bear” in the current circumstances. I admit it will be difficult.
The same goes for another issue that received media attention in the aftermath of the deadly attack. It is a perception that bears are concentrated in certain areas and cannot roam freely like they do in the large national parks of North America. Claudio Groff thinks this issue is over-emphasized. “Certainly, we are in the ecological corridor, not in Canada. [along which bears can move] exists,” he says. But he admits it could be improved. But like public education efforts, money is needed to create the park’s new protected corridors that allow bears to spread. And, as Marco Salvatori points out, “it would be hard to find anywhere else that would want to improve bear connectivity.”
The fact that Andrea’s Papi’s death has garnered so much sensational coverage in other parts of Italy and neighboring countries may represent a setback in rewilding in the Alps and wider areas. “There’s definitely a bias in how the media presents it,” he says. “There are many reasons people die in the mountains, and this one is getting a lot of attention.” Successful rewilding projects require a certain level of public buy-in. “Public opinion has shifted to a more hostile response to the reintroduction of carnivores.”
Internationally, if the EU is to take a leading role in the global biodiversity crisis that many believe it must, the EU’s own rewilding A high-profile incident resulting from one of the projects definitely makes things more difficult. Groff knows this. He has spent the last few days discussing international implications with the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s bear expert group.
Meanwhile, in the field, the reaction from my colleagues in the wildlife department was surprisingly quick. The bear in question, JJ4, was identified by matching genetic material found near Papi’s body with existing scientific data. On April 18, she was captured by Forrest her rangers using her traps and transferred to a detention center. Around the world, bears that have lost their fear of humans are usually considered too dangerous to be left alive. However, after the state president’s immediate euthanasia order was challenged in court by lawyers for LAV and other animal rights groups, JJ4 was given a suspended sentence. It claims it should be deported, but it is now up to the decision of ISPRA, Italy’s National Institute for Environmental Protection. Judgment is May 11th.
Meanwhile, the family at the center of everything has been very calm. Andrea Papi’s parents have requested that their privacy be respected. He didn’t go so far as to demand it, preferring to leave the decisions to the experts, and made it clear that he wasn’t in favor of the genocide advocated by Fugatti.
For those who have spent years working to save bears, such smart voices are reassuring. As the attention grows and the temperature of the debate cools down, it is hoped that a dispassionate, science-based approach will once again take center stage. says. “In fact, it shouldn’t have happened at all. But, you see, something positive could still come out of this tragedy.” “Why not call it the Andrea Papi Project? The state can fund it: The Andrea Papi Foundation. We can start now .”
