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Arizona campground closed after bear attacks woman

Arizona campground closed after bear attacks woman
by Jim Cross/KTAR (May 31st, 2012 @ 2:34pm)
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An Arizona campground will be closed until the end of August due to a bear attacking a 74-year-old Apache Junction woman.

The attack happened about 4:30 a.m. on Thursday at the Ponderosa Campground, about 10 miles east of Payson. The bear clawed its way through a tent and came in contact with the woman.

Jim Paxon with Arizona Game and Fish said the campground has been closed while the search is on for the bear.

"This bear poses a threat to public safety so we will lethally remove this bear," he said.

The victim was treated at Payson Regional Medical Center for non-threatening injuries and released. The woman's husband and dog were not hurt. Paxon said the victim didn't do anything to cause the attack.

"They did everything right," he said. "They didn't have any food in the tent."

With Arizona now in its 20th year of drought, the bears are desperately searching for food and water.

Tonto National Forest officials said an area closure order is effective beginning at 2:30 p.m. Thursday until August 31, or until the bear is found.

A Gilbert woman died last year several weeks after she was attacked by a bear in Pinetop

chumley wrote:Ponderosa was also shot by another camper at close range with a 9mm handgun, but was not killed, and left the area.

News last night said the man had a 9mm, but did not fire because of campers in the area. The bear attacked later and he said he wished he'd shot.

so is their method just to kill any bear they see until they prove with DNA testing that they got the right one? That seems incredibly dumb. The Payson Witch Hunts? Can we start calling it that?

@coanbru
Unless he was at close range and got a head shot-- I wonder what that 9mm would have actually done.

That's just sad.

Perhaps the Game and Fish briefing went like this the other day at the Group Campsite at Ponderosa, We are after the usual suspects and actually any suspects. I forgot the flyer with the picture of the suspect but the suspect looks quite similar to the one on the sign that states "Only You" at the entrance to the campground but the suspect is not known to be wearing a hat. As you head out take a good at the sign, make sure you don't shoot a Wookie and will meet up at Sundown at the Landmark in Christopher Creek.

@Tough_Boots
I agree, are they going to just eliminate every bear within 100 miles of the Rim now? They could be tranquilizing them, taking a blood sample for DNA, putting collars on them, and when they find their "suspect", they go back out and dispatch him. Not just mow down every bear they see, geez!!! I'm surprised that haven't shot any cubs yet on their little killing spree. Now you've got citizens with guns shooting at every thing they see too, regardless of whether the bear is being a problem or not....

@Nighthiker That sounds about right. Perhaps they've done enough to claim victory now. Perhaps it's good that most people don't realize how many bears are out there and how often they're close enough to see and smell us.

No need to worry. Looks like they "disposed" of two of those pesky bears. meh

If you kill enough bears, the public thinks you're doing something. Not killing bears, well then you might lose your position due to public perception of inaction. It doesn't matter to most that you kill the one bear that is causing the problem or a bunch of random bears. Shoot em all and let God sort em out.

Not to mention that when you find that one bear, you will probably discover that there was a person feeding it that lead to its bad behavior. Now if turnabout was fair play, perhaps we'd get to shoot that person too, but unfortunately our society has something called morality, which...apparently doesn't apply towards killing bears, only our own species.

I hope humanity keeps this style of morality in mind when E.T. finally visits and finds humans to be vermin crawling over a nice planet in their little corner of the galaxy.

You gotta admit that's a lot of late night bear attacks over a short period of time. Clearly at least one bear has become a predatory threat to sleeping campers.. Nothing worse than a bear ripping through your tent while you are asleep. I read that the one guy who was attacked while sleeping in his partially built cabin swore that he practiced all the food and odor rules.
I believe that lack of trash discipline in the area hurts everybody no matter how careful they are about odors and food..
Last time I looked at the Christopher Creek CG (several years ago) it had a rural area dumpster that would have been very inviting to bears. Maybe they have corrected that by now?
At the personal level I have seen daytime picnic parties in the Portal area scatter tortilla shells as they leave rather than packing them out.
I was at Spirit lake up in Flaming Gorge last week and found a campsite where someone dumped their left over chicken in a fire pit. It was still in a baggie.
Over the years, I have seen dispersed RVs along the rim actually bring their huge backyard propane BBQ grills to their campsite in the forest... I thought to myself, that must drive the bears crazy with desire. I suppose rim area Bears are very familiar at this point with people's bad habits. Sad situation because it is not their fault.

Outdoor Lover wrote:@Tough_Boots
I agree, are they going to just eliminate every bear within 100 miles of the Rim now? They could be tranquilizing them, taking a blood sample for DNA, putting collars on them, and when they find their "suspect", they go back out and dispatch him. Not just mow down every bear they see, geez!!! I'm surprised that haven't shot any cubs yet on their little killing spree. Now you've got citizens with guns shooting at every thing they see too, regardless of whether the bear is being a problem or not....

Unfortunately I think the problem is a lack of money. The Forest Service and AZ Game & Fish Dept. are both facing severe budgetary pressure, and it's a lot cheaper to shoot a bear than it is to tranquilize one and study it. That's sad, but I doubt this game plan changes any time soon.
I'm sure there are bear-proof trashcans at Ponderosa CG, and it is illegal to feed bears. Therefore the bear(s) either became habituated to human food intentionally or due to lack of proper disposal or the situation in terms of natural bear food is so bad that they're this desperate. I'd bet on the former, but the latter is most certainly a contributing factor.

Jim Lyding wrote:

Outdoor Lover wrote:@Tough_Boots
I'm sure there are bear-proof trashcans at Ponderosa CG

Don't be so sure. At least not so far...

the bear attack in Pinetop last year was around dumpsters, too. Maybe those putting non-bear-proof dumpsters near forest boundaries should be held responsible.

Additional newspaper coverage at:
http://www.paysonroundup.com/news/2012/ ... rd-attack/

According to Game and FIsh, apparently the usual suspects are not the right suspect.

@Nighthiker
They got the DNA results back already? If that's the case, expect more bears to be terminated.

People say the bear population in Arizona is healthy but for some reason I doubt that. To Azgfd, people seem way more important than the actual wildlife.

came upon a smallish female bear near Lowell telescope. this bear was unaffected by me or my attempts to scare it away. she just stood there, looking at me, then side to side, and finally after a few minutes just turned and waddled off.
being this close to marshall, upper mary, etc.. it seems she was fairly accustomed to humans and did not really act shy or aggressive, just indifferent.

The three bears that have been dispatched can not be connected to any of the previous attacks, and all have been cleared from the most dangerous of the attacks via DNA testing. Therefore, AZGFD is still on the lookout and feel that it is imperative that at least one bear is extremely dangerous and must be killed.

Read the whole article in the Payson Roundup:
http://www.paysonroundup.com/news/2012/ ... ill-loose/