{"id":210,"date":"2025-07-16T07:17:39","date_gmt":"2025-07-16T07:17:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/210\/"},"modified":"2025-07-16T07:17:39","modified_gmt":"2025-07-16T07:17:39","slug":"wayward-grizzly-bear-tex-shot-and-killed-on-texada-island-cos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/210\/","title":{"rendered":"Wayward grizzly bear ‘Tex’ shot and killed on Texada Island: COS"},"content":{"rendered":"

Work was underway to\u00a0pinpoint the bear’s location and translocate it to secluded area up the coast, says minister<\/p>\n

The Conservation Officer Service\u00a0has confirmed\u00a0that the grizzly bear roaming Texada Island\u00a0has been shot and killed, allegedly by a member of the public in the Van Anda area.<\/p>\n

“The COS can confirm it is the tagged grizzly bear seen on Texada Island in recent weeks, and that it was shot,” reads a COS\u00a0social media post on Tuesday (July 15). “The bear will undergo a necropsy.”<\/p>\n

The young grizzly, nicknamed “Tex” by locals who worried\u00a0about the bear’s\u00a0safety and were\u00a0urging for it to be translocated, was\u00a0spotted on\u00a0Texada\u00a0more than a month ago\u00a0after swimming over from the Powell River area.<\/p>\n

In 2024, the bear was relocated\u00a0twice. First, last September,\u00a0from Gibsons, and then from Sechelt \u2013\u00a0both times to a secluded coastal area to keep it away from people. However, on both occasions, the grizzly bear made its way back to urban areas\u00a0along the Sunshine Coast in just a few weeks.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:\u00a0North Island First Nation offers a home to wayward grizzly bear roaming Texada Island<\/a><\/p>\n

Randene Neill, Minister of Water, Land and Resource Stewardship, said the grizzly bear’s death comes as work was\u00a0underway with\u00a0First Nations on a new plan to attempt to translocate the bear to another remote area up the coast.\u00a0However, before they could pinpoint its location, they received reports about the bear’s death, she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“This isn\u2019t how we wanted this to end,” Neill said in a statement released Tuesday afternoon.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Since the young male grizzly bear\u00a0was spotted\u00a0on the small, normally bear-free island, Tex\u00a0has garnered a social media following with the “Save Tex – The Texada Island Grizzly Bear”\u00a0Facebook page and other social media groups. A post by Island resident\u00a0Ryan Michael\u00a0on Facebook Tuesday\u00a0criticized how the\u00a0government handled\u00a0the situation.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“He paid the ultimate price for human failure. His death was entirely preventable \u2013 yet B.C. leadership chose silence over action,” Michael wrote.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In a video statement,\u00a0COS Insp.\u00a0Simon Gravel\u00a0confirmed the grizzly bear was shot and killed.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“We do understand that this can generate a lot of interest and emotions from the public,” Gravel said.\u00a0“As soon as the investigation is completed, we’ll be happy to share more information.”<\/p>\n

The Mirror has contacted the First Nations that had been involved with rescuing the bear, and is awaiting a response.\u00a0<\/p>\n

If anyone has information about the grizzly bear’s killing, they are encouraged to report it to\u00a0the RAPP line at 1-877-952-7277.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Work was underway to\u00a0pinpoint the bear’s location and translocate it to secluded area up the coast, says minister…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":211,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[49,48,66,323],"class_list":{"0":"post-210","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-science","11":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=210"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/211"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=210"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=210"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=210"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}