Black vs. Griz
Coeur d'Alene Press | UPDATED 14 years AGO
<p>SHAWN GUST/Press Sean West, taxidermist and owner of Captured Expressions Taxidermy in Hayden, talks about the black bear that he donated to Idaho Fish and Game Tuesday in Coeur d'Alene. The bear will be used to educated and bring awareness to the species and how they differ from grizzly bears.</p>
<p>SHAWN GUST/Press The black bear that was euthanized in western Washington after becoming aggressive, was estimated by taxidermist Sean West to be nearly 500 pounds and 18 years old.</p>
A Coeur d'Alene taxidermist has donated his services to help educate Washington and Idaho hunters about the differences between black bears - legal to hunt in both states - and grizzly bears.
Sean West of Captured Expressions Taxidermy, who has won multiple awards for his taxidermy work, created a full-body black bear mount to be used in a new mobile bear education display because it was "the right thing to do."
"Knowing more about bears is important to anyone who lives in bear country," West said. "It's especially important to hunters and it's not always as easy as it seems. The whole purpose of the bear education trailer is to teach people more about bears so that they can minimize conflicts."
"I love wildlife and I care about people so it seemed like a pretty simple decision to me," West said.
Wildlife managers involved with bear-related issues in Idaho and Washington say West's donation will have a big impact.
"Every grizzly bear killed by a human in Washington in the last 20 years has been killed by someone with a rifle who said they thought it was a black bear," said Doug Zimmer of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. "Teaching people the difference - even reminding them that we have grizzly bears in Washington and across into North Idaho - is a vital part of helping them avoid problems and helping us recover grizzly bears and return them to state control."
Grizzly bears are federally-protected under the Endangered Species Act.
Zimmer says West's contribution of dozens of hours of highly-skilled artistic labor to make a life-like full-body mount for the mobile display will go a long way toward those goals.
"Even the people who do see bears in Washington and Idaho seldom have the luxury of being able to study the body shape, pelt color, claw shape and other species identification points," Zimmer said. "Sean did a magnificent job of mounting this bear so that we can display and emphasize those points. He even posed the bear with one paw raised so we can easily show the claw and pad shape - both key identification points."
"Thousands of people are going to see this bear over the years," Zimmer said. "We hope they're going to come away with a better understanding and appreciation of bears, thanks in good part to Sean's work. It's a beautiful mount. He did a great job and we're very grateful."
The bear was about 18 years old and weighed around 500 pounds, West said.
The donated mount will travel the Washington-North Idaho area as part of the mobile bear education display developed as a cooperative project of the North Cascades Grizzly Bear Ecosystem Subcommittee of the Inter-agency Grizzly Bear Committee, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Missoula-based Center for Wildlife Information.
Cabela's and CounterAssault Bear Deterrent Spray also contributed to the development and stocking of the trailer.
The black bear was donated by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. Wildlife agents had to kill the bear, which had been fed by well-meaning but misguided local people, leading it to break into residences in southwestern Washington.
"Part of the lesson we'll be teaching is what happens when people feed bears or don't store pet food, garbage and other bear attractants properly," Zimmer said. "That's why this big beautiful bear is an educational mount and not out in the woods being a bear. At least, through Sean's work, we'll be able to help people how to avoid outcomes like that."