Bear cub rescued from Lac du Bonnet fires dies
A soot-covered, seven-pound black bear cub, who captured the hearts of Manitobans after being rescued from the wildfire northeast of Lac du Bonnet, has died.
The tiny bear suffered smoke inhalation and severe burns to her paws, before she was brought to Black Bear Rescue Manitoba in Stonewall on Thursday evening. She was thought to have been alone for two days in the fire zone, separated from her mother, until a Manitoba Hydro sub-contractor found her alongside Wendigo Road.
After her rescue, thousands rallied online behind the diminutive cub, offering their prayers and commenting on her 'survivor spirit.' On a Friday evening Facebook post, which has since been 'liked' by more than 15,000 people, one person wrote to the rescue, saying: 'My husband thinks this little one should be called Survivor.' Someone else suggested the name Phoenix.
BLACK BEAR RESCUE MANITOBA
Sayen, a black bear cub that was rescued from the wildfire northeast of Lac du Bonnet, has died.
The rescue would decide on the name Sayen.
Roger Stearns, who operates the bear rescue with his wife Judy, told the Free Press the cub died suddenly in the early hours of Saturday morning, likely due to smoke exposure, which a local veterinarian had told them caused swelling in her lungs. But they thought the featherweight bear would pull through.
'I was optimistic. We just thought this is going to be a big workload – but that's what we're here for. The care of all four feet and getting them healed up would have a months-long process of regrowing and cleaning and fighting off any infection,' said Stearns. 'My wife and I are both very shocked.'
The 'Wendigo #62 fire' in the Rural Municipality of Lac du Bonnet started Tuesday morning, resulting in the evacuation of hundreds of people, the destruction of at least 28 homes and the deaths of Richard and Sue Nowell. The couple was trapped by the out-of-control fire. The cub's death, meanwhile, was a reminder of the non-human toll of wildfires.
On Thursday, Devon Griffith, who owns Griff's Repair, a heavy-machinery repair shop in Lac du Bonnet, was working as a sub-contractor with Manitoba Hydro. He was working to get burnt hydro poles hauled away, so new poles could be installed and power restored to the area.
On one trip in, he spotted a baby bear running across the road into a ditch. Hauling heavy equipment, he was unable to stop, his wife Karlee Nardai told the Free Press Saturday, as Griffith was still out hauling downed poles. He saw the bear again on a second and third trip and alerted a nearby hydro worker and an employee of the rural municipality.
The group caught the bear and placed her in a cat carrier Griffith had brought from home. He brought her home and into their barn. The bear drank some water and calf milk replacement they had on hand, after needing to bottle feed a calf last year.
'She wheezing pretty bad – you could tell she had taken in a bunch of smoke,' Nardai said. Not knowing how long the bear would be with them, Nardai went into town to buy some supplies for her – including whole milk and fish oil – and to pick up a dog crate from her mom. Soon after she returned, a provincial conservation officer came by to take the bear to the Stonewall rehab.
'The biologist told us that (the cub's mom) likely was trying to get out of the way and the little one couldn't keep up, so they got separated,' Nardai said. 'I'm sure there's a lot of other animals that are in tough shape out there, so he's got his eyes peeled every time he's in there now. He was saying last night, like, 'well, what if I find its brother?' I was like, well, 'pick it up.''
When the cub arrived at the bear rescue around 8 p.m., it was all hands on deck.
BLACK BEAR RESCUE MANITOBA
The first layer of the cub's paw pads had burned off from the fire.
Within an hour, a vet had arrived and gave the bear pain medication. The vet inspected her feet and noted her cough, instructing the Stearns to turn up the humidity in her enclosure to try to loosen up what had gotten into her lungs. The first layer of her paw pads had burned off and they were banaged with gauze.
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'She was running through embers, it was that hot, that on all four feet, she lost the layer of her pads, and she's breathing in that air,' Stearns said. 'When she was first taking water, there was soot coming out of her nose. The vet did listen to her chest, but you expect, if it's been through something like that, that the chest isn't going to sound normal.'
On Friday, the cub was coming out of her den house, drinking some milk and walking around her enclosure. Her cough hadn't worsened. She was scheduled to be taken into the vet in Woodlands on Saturday morning for additional cleaning and treatment of her paws, as well as for an X-ray of her lungs. At 3 a.m., Stearns saw on a camera that she was curled up in a pile of straw in front of her den house, but when he came to check on her early in the morning, she was dead.
Stearns said anyone who encounts distressed or injured wildlife should reach out to Manitoba Conservation's tip line or call 1-800-782-0076.
'We're all guests in wildlife habitat,' Stearns added. 'It was tragic, the loss of life out there, with that couple, but there's also hundreds or thousands of animals perishing as well.'
marsha.mcleod@freepress.mb.ca
Marsha McLeodInvestigative reporter
Marsha is an investigative reporter. She joined the Free Press in 2023.
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