{"id":751,"date":"2010-08-05T22:38:00","date_gmt":"2010-08-05T21:38:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/followthebaldie.com\/?p=751"},"modified":"2016-10-24T22:19:41","modified_gmt":"2016-10-24T21:19:41","slug":"a-cantabrian-brown-bear-encounter-in-the-valley-of-aguayo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oreneta.com\/baldie\/2010\/08\/05\/a-cantabrian-brown-bear-encounter-in-the-valley-of-aguayo\/","title":{"rendered":"A Cantabrian brown bear encounter in the Valley of Aguayo"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the previous post<\/a> I named two of the problems facing rural walkers in Spain as a lack of refreshments and motorway building. Judging by the numbers of young horses and cattle loose on the slopes of Otero running down into the Embalse de Alsa near San Miguel de Aguayo in Cantabria, the first problem is unlikely to affect the brown bear we heard roaring early on the morning of July 24th in the beech forest between the summit of Otero and Vallejo Ruc\u00e1ndano. The second however will surely have an impact: as the map<\/a> over at Aves del norte de Burgos<\/a> shows, the AP-69 Dos Mares motorway will tear right through the middle of this zone, just as soon as government funds are available for its construction.<\/p>\n

I've lived quite a lot of my life in the countryside, and spent some formative years in the vicinity of a brutally-run slaughterhouse, so I'm quite certain that the sound that chilled our bones wasn't that of an injured cow or enraged bull, and anyone else who has heard bears before will confirm that it is not something one easily forgets. Nevertheless, I did at first question my ears, because Cantabrian brown bears very rarely make it this far east--the map over at Fundaci\u00f3n Oso Pardo<\/a> shows an eastern population of 30 bears concentrated in eastern Le\u00f3n and western Palencia, with offshoots in Campoo de Suso and Li\u00e9bana. Recent sightings of another bear in Valderredible<\/a> on the Ebro on the other side of the reservoir may suggest the beginnings of an eastward trend.<\/p>\n

One of the interesting things about the article is its propagation of the myth of conflict-free human-bear coexistence. This seems to me to be driven by often cuddly-animal ecologist and rural tourism propaganda (the FOP does a pretty good job<\/a>, however), and it ignores the evidence from for example Eastern Europe, the Balkans and Asia Minor. Jerina et al, Modeling the brown bear population in Slovenia<\/a>, report similar naivety during the early phase of bear management there, and other papers (eg Ambarlı & Bilgin Human\u2013brown bear conflicts in Artvin, northeastern Turkey<\/a>) report considerable resentment by unprepared farmers and villagers of bear attacks on livestock, beehives and orchards, as well as a slow trickle of fatal attacks on humans by brown bears. This doesn't perhaps justify the killing of brown bears in for example the Pyrenees by farmers as well as hunters, but it does help explain it and why it is unlikely to disappear.<\/p>\n

The potential for bears encountering humans is currently pretty small--the countryside is generally empty, and humans rarely leave the protection of cars or buildings, and bears don't seem to have taken to dumpster diving to the same extent as in Canada--but pre-20th century Spanish literature provides the occasional glimpse of ursine terror. My favourite is in the late-15th century Las sergas de Esplandi\u00e1n<\/em><\/a><\/em> by Garci Rodr\u00edguez de Montalvo, which, except for Maneli's subsequent miraculous recovery, provides a pretty good account of a bear attack<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Mucho placer hubieron aquellos caballeros en se ver, por cualquier manera que fuesen, salidos en tierra; y como la barca \u00e1 la orilla llegase, salieron fuera, y at\u00e1ndola por la cadena \u00e1 un \u00e1rbol, dejando en ella el uno de sus escuderos, acordaron de saber qu\u00e9 remedio all\u00ed se hallar\u00eda; y comenzaron de entrar por la isla, llevando los yelmos en sus cabezas y los escudos \u00e1 los cuellos. Mas no anduvieron mucho, que en un valle hallaron una fuente debajo de unos altos y hermosos \u00e1rboles, donde quitados sus yelmos, se lavaron y bebieron del agua, que dulce y sabrosa les pareci\u00f3. El escudero que con ellos iba, que era del rey de Dacia, que Argento se llamaba, les dijo: \u00abBuenos se\u00f1ores, yo, que vengo sin armas, si lo ten\u00e9is por bien, quiero saber qu\u00e9 hay en esta isla, porque, seg\u00fan lo que hallare, as\u00ed tomar\u00e9is el acuerdo. \u2014 Bien ser\u00e1, dijeron ellos, pero sea de manera que no vos perdamos. \u2014 Asi lo har\u00e9, dijo \u00e9l, que si desde aquella cumbre no viere lo que busco, tornarme he para vosotros.\u00bb Entonces se fu\u00e9 por entre las matas, y siendo una pieza dellos alejado, vido contra si venir un oso muy grande \u00e1 maravilla, de que hubo gran temor; y dando muy grandes voces que lo socorriesen, se subi\u00f3 muy presto en un \u00e1rbol; mas el oso lo sigui\u00f3 hasta ser al pi\u00e9 del \u00e1rbol. Los caballeros, que \u00e1 la fuente quedaron, como las voces de Argento oyeron, fueron \u00e1 mas correr h\u00e1cia all\u00e1, con tanta priesa, que los yelmos no pudieron tomar, y se quedaron cabe la fuente; y llegando al escudero, vi\u00e9ronle estar en el \u00e1rbol, y el oso que sub\u00eda por lo tomar; mas ellos dieron muy grandes voces porque lo dejase, \u00e1 las cuales el oso volviendo el rostro, vido los caballeros que contra \u00e9l iban, descendi\u00f3 cuanto mas pudo, y se volvi\u00f3 para ellos levantado en los pi\u00e9s traseros. Maneli, como r\u00ede mas edad y mas recio que el Rey fuese, iba delante, poniendo el escudo encima de la cabeza, y la espada en la mano fu\u00e9 para \u00e9l, y di\u00f3le un gran golpe en la cabeza, que le derrib\u00f3 la una oreja con parte de las quijadas; mas el oso le tom\u00f3 entre sus fuertes brazos y trabo con los dientes en el escudo tan fuertemente, que todos pasaron de la otra parte; as\u00ed que, Maneli fue tan embarazado de los brazos, del oso que consigo apretado le tenia, que no se pudo valer ni hacer mas, y pareci\u00f3le que todos los huesos del cuerpo le quebraban. Mas \u00e1 esta hora lleg\u00f3 el rey de Dacia, y hiri\u00f3 con su espada al oso en el un brazo de tal golpe, que se lo cort\u00f3 todo \u00e1 cercen, junto \u00e1 la mano, de manera que luego cay\u00f3 en tierra. El oso di\u00f3 un gran bramido, y soltando el caballero, comenz\u00f3 de huir en tres pi\u00e9s, y el Rey en pos d\u00e9l corriendo por lo herir; y no lo pudiendo alcanzar, torn\u00f3se donde Maneli estaba asaz quebrantado de la batalla del oso; y como lleg\u00f3 \u00e1 \u00e9l, pregunt\u00f3le c\u00f3mo le iba. \u00abMal me va, dijo \u00e9l; que aquella mala bestia endiablada me ha quebrantado todo mi cuerpo.\u00bb<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The bear might have got him anyway, but Wikipedia explains one basic error in Maneli's approach<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Running away or climbing a tree can activate the bear's hunting instincts and lead to it perceiving the human as prey. If a bear does charge, persons are advised to hold their ground, as most bear charges are bluffs. Finally, if a bear does attack, the usual advice is to curl into a fetal position so as to shield vital organs and appear non-threatening. If this is not effective in stopping the attack, the only option left is to fight the bear in any way you can. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The adventures of Esplandi\u00e1n<\/em> is a work of chivalry, so it doesn't mention that the best defence is to travel with a slower-moving companion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With brief ramblings on population spread, and a longer rant on the vexed and under-reported subject of bear-human conflict, with a 15th century Spanish account of a bear attack.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[31,40,44,29,36,6,42,46,37,43,45,35,38,39,32,33,34,41],"class_list":["post-751","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-default","tag-ap-69-dos-mares","tag-autopista","tag-bear-attack","tag-burgos","tag-campoo","tag-cantabria","tag-cantabrian-brown-bear","tag-chivalry","tag-el-valle-de-aguayo","tag-eurasian-brown-bear","tag-fatal-bear-attack","tag-los-aguayos","tag-oso-pardo","tag-oso-parod-cantabrico","tag-san-miguel-de-aguayo","tag-santa-maria-de-aguayo","tag-santa-olalla-de-aguayo","tag-ursus-arctos-arctos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/oreneta.com\/baldie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/oreneta.com\/baldie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/oreneta.com\/baldie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oreneta.com\/baldie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oreneta.com\/baldie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=751"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/oreneta.com\/baldie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/751\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3067,"href":"https:\/\/oreneta.com\/baldie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/751\/revisions\/3067"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/oreneta.com\/baldie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oreneta.com\/baldie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oreneta.com\/baldie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}