Cochrane residents will have an opportunity to learn how to properly use bear spray during a hands-on demonstration this weekend.<\/p>\n
Wildlife Coexistence Cochrane is adding a bear spray demonstration on Sept. 5 to its Discovery Days activities at The Station, 360 Railway St., giving participants a chance to experience a simulated bear encounter and practise deploying inert training spray.<\/p>\n
Hendrik B\u00f6sch, who heads Wildlife Coexistence Cochrane, says the idea came from repeatedly meeting people who carry bear spray but have never actually used it.<\/p>\n
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\u201cMany people said, \u2018Yeah, I have been carrying it in the mountains for years but never used it, don\u2019t really know how to use it,\u2019\u201d B\u00f6sch says.<\/p>\n
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B\u00f6sch says the goal is to make sure people are prepared before they find themselves in a close encounter with wildlife.<\/p>\n
From carrying spray to knowing how to use it<\/p>\n
The demonstration will use a bear ramp supplied by the Mountain View Bear Smart group. The device gives participants a sense of how quickly a bear can approach and how little time there may be to draw, unlock and deploy the spray.<\/p>\n
B\u00f6sch says the training will cover where to carry bear spray, how to remove the safety and how to practise using it.<\/p>\n
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“A lot of people also don’t know that bear spray only holds like 6 to 8 seconds of a load and that they are not supposed to spray the whole thing at once.”<\/p>\n
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Fish and Wildlife representatives and members of Mountain View Bear Smart will also be on hand to answer questions about wildlife encounters and safe recreation.<\/p>\n
Avoiding an encounter comes first<\/p>\n
The training will also emphasize avoiding wildlife conflicts in the first place.<\/p>\n
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\u201cMake noise, especially in areas where there is no clear line of sight and there\u2019s a risk of surprising a wild animal,\u201d B\u00f6sch says.<\/p>\n
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B\u00f6sch says carrying bear spray can be appropriate in some areas within Cochrane, particularly along wildlife corridors and trails near waterways and forested areas.<\/p>\n
RELATED STORIES<\/p>\n
He points to the Bow River, Jumping Pound Creek, Big Hill Creek and other forested areas as places where people may encounter wildlife.<\/p>\n
Bear spray can also be effective against other wildlife threats, including cougars and coyotes, he says.<\/p>\n
Training runs Saturday afternoon<\/p>\n
The free training is for people aged 16 and older and will be held Saturday only, with sessions at 12:30, 1:30, 2:30 and 3:30 p.m. on the lawn outside The Station.<\/p>\n
Each session is limited to 25 participants. Sign-up sheets will be available at the Wildlife Coexistence Cochrane booth inside The Station.<\/p>\n
People who don’t get a spot can still watch the demonstration and learn about bear spray. The training uses inert spray, so there is no risk if some is carried by the wind.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cochrane residents will have an opportunity to learn how to properly use bear spray during a hands-on demonstration…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":881038,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[49,48,66,323],"class_list":["post-881037","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-science","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/881037","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=881037"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/881037\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/881038"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=881037"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=881037"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=881037"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}