Bear faces expulsion from sanctuary after killing spree

TWO years after it was released into the Spanish Pyrenees as part of a conservation programme, Goiat, a brown bear, faces expulsion over a predatory rampage that has enraged local farmers.

The 31-stone male was captured in Slovenia and transferred to the Alt Pirineu National Park in Catalonia in 2016 as part of a European project to save the brown bear population in the region.

But Goiat, whose name means “lad” in Catalan, is now to be ejected after embarking on a killing spree against local livestock. The bear is blamed for 15 attacks since April, including the deaths of six horses and four foals, as well as several sheep.

Under pressure from farmers, the Catalan government has announced plans to capture and remove Goiat. Options include moving it to a bear sanctuary, returning him to the wild in Slovenia or even euthanasia – the latter a last resort that authorities admit would prove controversial. Any decision must be approved by French authorities, partners in the Pyroslife project.

The programme has been highly successful in boosting numbers, which dwindled to just three in the Nineties but have recovered to 43 today.

However, conservationists were concerned that the majority of the renewed population were the offspring of just one particularly virile male, Pyros, another Slovenian bear introduced in 1997, which is reported to mate even with its own grandchildren.

Joan Caball, of Unió de Pagesos, Catalonia’s largest agricultural union, said: “We have to consider what number of animals we can host in the territory.”

Jaume Grau, of Ecologists in Action, admitted farmers were “right to complain that we urbanites sometimes don’t know everything about how they live there”.