The process of knocking out a bear

We have a new arrival at the shelter in the form of a teeny, tiny, 39 lb bear we named Trouble after all the hassle she gave the conservation officer trying to catch her. He was out in the field for four hours trying to get her but she kept evading. This brings the total number of bears here up to seven now. Three boys: Bennie, Rascal and Berwyn, and four girls, Shawn, Pumpkin, Polaris and Trouble.

Whenever  we get a new bear they are first put into a separate enclosure from the main group. This is to quarantine them, in case they have any infections or diseases that they could pass onto the others. After a few weeks of quarantine, if they are healthy enough they will be moved into the large enclosure with the other bears. First though we have to do an overall check on the bear, take measurements and do a few other things before they are ready to be moved, and to do all this the bear has to be knocked out.

Angelika will prepare the correct amount of tranquilizer and administer it to the bear, while a volunteer will keep track of the time. The tranquilizer can take around 15-20 minutes to take effect so timekeeping is very important. Once the bear is out they will be carried to the entrance and placed into a net and weighed. Bennie, the first bear to arrive here weighed in at over 70lbs when I did this, so carrying him required a lot of strength and some help. The bear is then moved over to a work table and it is a big group effort to get everything done before the bear starts to wake. Angelika will administer eye drops, de-worm the bear, clean the government ear tag and give the bear a shelter ear tag. Meanwhile Kim (another volunteer) and I clean the paws and take paw prints, using paint. I have discovered that I have a real talent for getting pretty paw prints, so I really enjoy doing this. We then take fur for DNA as well as some to use during fundraisers. We bottle some fur and turn some into necklaces, which always raise a lot of money. Finally the bear is micro-chipped so there is another form of identification incase the bear loses the ear tag, then they are put back into the main enclosure if they are of a healthy enough weight. Someone has to keep watch over them while they re-awake from the tranquilizer as the other bears, curious as they are, might come over and start hassling the drowsy bear, especially if they are smaller.

The whole process can go very quickly and everyone is doing something, whether recording or working on the actual bear, it can be quite stressful with so many people around so we try and do this in groups, working on the bears one after the other to minimise the amount of times we go up to the pen. Just before release we will do this all over again to ensure they are healthy enough to be released, only this time it will require many more people as the bears should hopefully weigh over 100lbs.