British Columbia wildlife officials said Tuesday that DNA evidence has conclusively tied four grizzly bears to the deaths of a mother and her adult daughter earlier this month near Bella Coola, a remote community about 620 miles north of Vancouver.
The British Columbia Conservation Officer Service said a female grizzly and her three yearling cubs were responsible for killing Jenny Balcarras, 48, and her 20-year-old daughter, Selah Reed. All four bears were killed by officers after the attack to prevent further harm to the public.
Inspector Jeff Tyre told an online briefing that investigators believe the attack involved predatory behavior, a pattern he described as highly unusual for the species.
“Our investigation also found that this attack likely involved predatory behavior, which I can tell you is very rare,” Tyre said. “That is to say, we don’t know how it started, but we know how it ended.”
The two women’s remains were found roughly 1,490 feet apart near a trail outside Bella Coola. Family members alerted authorities after Reed failed to join a routine Saturday night phone call with her sister. Searchers first located Balcarras’ remains, then found Reed’s remains in a bear cache, a site where bears stockpile food.
Tyre said these four bears were not connected to a separate grizzly attack last November on a group of about 20 elementary school students and teachers in the same area, which left 11 people injured, two of them critically.
The latest deaths have unsettled the Nuxalk Nation, which was still recovering from the earlier attack. Local authorities have put in place a voluntary curfew, and police have been escorting children to school.
“This attack has been deeply re-triggering for our community members as we continue to recover from last year’s attack,” said Tlhmtimut Samuel Schooner, the Nuxalk Nation’s elected chief councilor.
Schooner said community support services will remain available for as long as residents need them.
Tyre said wildlife officers do not have the option of relocating or rehabilitating bears involved in fatal attacks, since they are considered too dangerous to release back into any environment where they could encounter people.
