Hunting Foes Try To Foil Guides

Bear hunting opponents are trying to foil hunting guides and their clients on northern Vancouver Island.

About a dozen members of the Vancouver-based Bear Watch are following hunters to prevent them from shooting black bears.

Six members of the group, from Vancouver and the United States, were accused of interfering with a legal hunt after air horns were used to scare away bears.

The harassment campaign begun in mid-April is aimed at discouraging foreign hunters, mostly from the United States and Germany, Bear Watch spokeswoman Jana Thomas said Monday.

Foreigners, required by law to hire guide-outfitters to shoot game in British Columbia, took out 2,033 black bear provincial hunting permits in 1994.

Bear Watch has targeted an outfitter that charges clients $3,000 to $24,000 (U.S.) to hunt black bears, grizzlies and Roosevelt elk.

Bear Watch member David Barbarash said a guide tried to force a Bear Watch truck off a logging road Friday, then assaulted a group member.

He said when six group members went to the Campbell River Royal Canadian Mounted Police office on Sunday, they were surrounded by 15 hunters and friends who pounded on their vehicles.