Dedicated to Vasiliy Sergeevich Chramtsov’s 70th anniversary
a documentary story
I never hunted bears. I studied these animals, investigated their ecology, or, putting it simplier, their life. In the southern regions of the Primorye lives mainly the Himalayan bear, so it’s natural that the Himalayan bear was the object of my study. Local hunters usually call the Himalayan bear “a white-breasted”, and in the literature it is also called “black”, and, in contrast to the brown bear, the first has been studied, to put it mildly, poorly, superficially.
Working in the Lazovsky nature reserve, I decided to dedicate myself to studying this inhabitant of the Ussuriyskaya taiga. I did my observations on the territory of the nature reserve. By the way, I’d like to remark that its possible to conduct research of wild animals by sitting in a study-room. For that one only should surround oneself with books, magazines, reports and collect, or, to be more precise, pick out of them the material even for a thesis for a Doctor’s degree. But I studied the bears right in the taiga, in their environment. Though, I, surely, used some literature sources, too. One can’t do it another way. But, nevertheless, I collected the main material in the forest. Anyway, investigating wild animals by sitting in a study… You know, it’s not my method, not my style.
I spent my childhood in close contact with nature – among birds, frogs, snakes, chipmunks and squirrels, so, I’m at home in taiga. Well… While studying the bears I often met them, watched their behavior, reaction, lifestyle. And that’s what I want to say.
When one meets a bear, the situation may proceed in different ways. The bears, as well as people, have each their own character, their individual habits, manners, their emotional psychology. When meeting a man, the bear may act in one of the five ways:
The first way is the following: having seen a man or having felt his smell, the beast rushes away in panic. One would only see in passing the bear’s back and… just a moment ago it was here – and it is already not, as if blown away by wind. I’ve called this behavioral pattern “a panic”.
The second way: the bear doesn’t run away at once, but standing on his back paws looks round, as if it wants to see with its own eyes, where the danger comes from and whether there is any at all. Having stood like that for about two minutes, the bear goes away. Simply goes away. This way I called “curiosity”.
As for the third way, here the bear acts more aggressively. It doesn’t run, doesn’t go away, doesn’t hide. It stands still – sniffs, breathes heavily and noisily through the nose, chatters its teeth, but… doesn’t go away! In such situations it’s better not to play with the destiny. It’s better to recede slowly, walk round and escape the dangerous meeting. I called this way “warning”.
The fourth situation happens less frequently, but, however, it does happen. The bear ruffles hair on the back of the head, chatters its teeth, throws itself towards the man, but doesn’t attack, only scares him away. I gave this way of behavior the name “psychological attack”.
And the fifth… The fifth kind of the situation may be dangerous for life: the bear attacks. As a rule, it is the bear that was shot at that attacks. Bears don’t usually fall dead after being shot at. A wounded beast is likely either to run away or to attack. A wounded bear is very angry and aggressive. In a fight with such a bear man, as a rule, looses. In the most favorable case he becomes disabled, in the least favorable… there are left only pieces of cloth and separate parts of body. I’ve called this way of behavior “a fight”.
So, once I had a meeting which, how to say… it doesn’t fit in my five situations! It was an unpredictable meeting, something like an exception from the general rules. It isn’t in vain that people say: “there is no rule without an exception”. It happened in summer. The forester of the nature reserve Yershov and I passed a small mountain ridge and started coming down to the valley of a mountain spring that flows into the Mulengow bay. The day was warm, sunny, as it usually happens after a thunderstorm. When we were coming down the slope of the hill, I noticed an old lime-tree in the side.
- Stop! – I said to the forester. – There must be a lair in this lime-tree.
We began going round the tree and… That’s right! At the height of 5-6 meters from the ground there was a hole in the trunk. It was an entrance to the lair.
It should be mentioned that the Himalayan bears go to winter hibernation only in the hollows of big tree-trunks. At least in the normal natural conditions that species makes its lair only in hollows.
- Well, - I said to the forester, - you go down to the sea, make a fire, boil the tea, and I will make some measurements here and come just for dinner. All right?
Yershov went away. For about ten minutes I was occupied measuring the lair, then drew a scheme of the place, put down all the information in my diary. “It seems that’s enough now”, - I said to myself. – “And now – to the sea!”
Having put on my rucksack I began going down the same animals’ trail down which the forester had gone.
I had made half hundred steps this way when something black in about fifty meters ahead attracted my attention… “My god, what is there? A burnt stump”, - I thought, but stopped to be on the safe side.
The thick of the nut-tree didn’t let me determine the thing. I waited, and… The “stump” started moving… The black mass moved towards me. “A bear!” – the thought flashed, - “what’s happened to it?”
- Where are you trudging! – I shouted.
The beast went faster. I’d better gone away from the eyesight of the predator, but… “Hasn’t it understood?” – I was sure that the bear simply hadn’t realized which side I was and was simply going at guesswork. But… God knows what may happen!
I took out a gun and made a precautionary shot. And I shouldn’t have done that, shouldn’t have done that at all. First of all, I had only two cartridges in the charger, I had forgotten to fill the charger and only then understood that, as ill luck would have it, I had only one cartridge left. And secondly… My shot as if whipped the beast: the bear began approaching jumping; it was clear it was going to attack. It turned out that it was lying in ambush and waiting for me, but when it saw that I had stopped and wasn’t going towards it, decided to go to me itself!
And then it was too late to run away. Nearby there was a cedar. The instinct of self-preservation urged me on action. I jumped, caught hold of the lower branch and… I should have made a jerk to catch hold of the next one. Having encompassed the trunk of the tree with my legs, I made an effort to climb higher and…
I would probably have done that, but the branch that I was holding on to cracked, and I fell on the ground like a sack. In my right hand I was still holding the gun. It hindered me to climb the tree, but I somehow didn’t think of putting it into the holster.
I fell down. And at that very moment foam splashed into my face, and I saw yellowy-pink fangs.
Perhaps, it was my angel that directed my hand with the gun, or I myself put it instinctively in front of the beast. The shot turned out to be practically point-blank. The bear bent in an arc at once and calmed down.
I should have got up and run away from the danger, but I couldn’t. My feet became numb.
I knew that sometimes after a shot a beast falls, as if dead, but after a minute that “dead” beast suddenly jumps and rushes swiftly… Other animals rush away, but a bear usually rushes at the rifleman.
Of course, I knew that, but… I must have had a shock.
After having calmed down a bit I pulled my feet from under the bear’s body, got up, as if I had just learned how to walk, and put the empty gun into the holster. The bear was still lying without a single movement. Slowly, leaning on a stick, I came down to the sea. As I was walking down, I thought: “How is the forester there?.. Maybe, the bear had killed him before attacking me.” But… A fire was burning and the figure of the forester was looming on the bank of the spring. Having seen me, he immediately asked: “Something has happened, hasn’t it?”
- Why, haven’t you heard the shots?
- No, of course. The sea is making noise nearby and…
- Well, I’ve killed a bear, - I said to the forester.
- A bear? – Yershov’s face grew longer and the freckles became brighter. – But how could I have passed and not noticed it?
- That is what surprises me very much, too. But, well, - I said. – Let’s go to the cordon. We’ll take the forester and come together.
Later, when we were cutting the carcass, it turned out that the bullet struck in the neck vertebrae. And on the whole the bear, or, to be more precise, the she-bear, didn’t have any defects, was fattened and rather big.
- The matter is like this, - Aleksandr Ivanovich, the forester from the cordon, told me. – A week ago in the Mulengow bay, just where you were boiling your tea on the fire, some poachers killed two bear-cubs. One of them was born last year, the other – this year. I often met their whole family in Mulengow. The bear-cubs were playing on the bank of the bay. Their mother was lying somewhere nearby. Having shot the bear-cubs, the poachers loaded them on their cutter and sailed away. The she-bear saw all that, but couldn’t save her cubs… But she’s a mother, and, you know, it isn’t so easy to forget it when you lose your children… That is the cause of her being aggressive, - Aleksandr Ivanovich concluded his speech philosophically.
The arguments of the forester seemed convincing to me. It was an extraordinary case. But, you know… It lied heavy on my conscience. I could have escaped the meeting – I could have receded, gone round…
“Well! But what a researcher I am if I run away from the object of my research”, - I tried to justify myself. And, besides… I had decided to gather material and make a monograph on the ecology of the Himalayan bear. But… Oh, that “but”! One can’t manage to escape it! This time my evil luck gave me a worse surprise. I thought I would work for some at least two more years to gather the missing material for the monograph, but I was dismissed from my work. Now, with the new system, it is not a problem to dismiss a man. And, what is a pity, my plans, my work, my dreams of publishing a monograph about bears – all that has been destroyed.
I tried to collect the rest of the material privately on the neighboring territory – in the forestry. But here I wasn’t lucky again. I didn’t find any bears in the forestry. However, I met timber cutters everywhere. Whining of motor-saws, clank of loggings, rumbling of cars, crack of falling trees - that’s what I found in taiga. And what attracts attention is: I haven’t found a single hollowed tree, where a bear could possibly make a lair. If there are no lairs, there are no bears – that’s interdependence.
And not so long ago the Himalayan bear was noted down in The Red Book of the Russian Federation.
But the officials didn’t like it. “Why! The white-breasted bear is a perfect object for hunting, and it should be noted down in The Red Book? No! It won’t go this way.” And… they crossed out the Himalayan bear from the list of the species to be protected.
But I would say it another way. The Himalayan bear has been crossed out of life. This species has again turned out to be on the verge of total extermination.
Well… And what would have happened if the last bullet hadn’t struck in the bear’s spinal cord and it wouldn’t have fallen dead? Then… Then, first of all, this story wouldn’t exist. And, secondly, no one would have found out the cause of the attack and I would have turned out to be guilty of it.
Wicked tongues would, of course, whisper caustically: “He is to blame!” Or… Anyway, wicked tongues can say anything. And the tragedy in the Mulengow bay would still be a mystery.
As for the monograph, I’m making it anyway. The question is whether I will be able to publish it, and besides, who needs it nowadays?..
The original text has been slightly edited by Alexey Zborovskiy (new_jalsomino [at] yahoo.com) in coordination with the author
Translation from Russian by Phoenixia