Some Germans were walking around the Balderschwang area of Germany (it's a remote valley between Munich and the Bodensee in the far south of Germany), and came upon some bear 'poo'. Fresh bear poo.
So the question is....do we now have a bear problem in Germany again (since 2006)?
Somewhere in the last half of the 1800s....the last bear in Germany was hunted down, shot, and that was the end of the bear population until 2006. Then entered Bruno (the friendly bear) onto the German landscape. Bruno walked around and ended up killing some sheep, getting himself onto the 'bad-bear' list, and identified to be hunted down. I could write a 500 page story over the episode, but it's safe to say around four weeks later.....a hunter found and shot down Bruno. He's stuffed and in a Bavarian museum in Munich (I've seen the display myself).
Where this new bear came from? Mostly likely the Czech or Croatian region...having crossed over the Alps.
An American, who I knew in the 2006 period, who hunted as a hobby, got into this discussion with German hunters. It's common knowledge that bears were a regular event of life in the 1600s and probably one of the reasons you didn't walk alone in the woods that much. By the 1700s....firearms were becoming part of life, and by the early 1800s....bear-hunting was taking down the population of bears in Germany.
In the summer of 2006, there were two basic events being reported on the front page of Bild (the newspaper) on a daily basis....the World Cup in Germany, and Bruno the bear activities. Yes, they'd even named the bear.
Finnish hunters were hired and brought to Bavaria (they are the few around Europe) who generally hunt bears on a regular basis. The Finns just weren't up to the task, and were 'let go' from the contract around two weeks later. In the end, it was a regional German hunter who took down Bruno.
It will be curious to see how this plays out.
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