BRUNO ESCAPES AGAIN - A weird bear hunt in Germany

DER SPIEGEL ^ | June 16, 2006 | cgh/ap/dpa/afp

[Atlantic Bridge]

Once again, Bruno the bear has escaped his hunters in Bavaria after repeated sightings in a popular hiking area. Meanwhile, a quick search on Google turns up plenty of Bruno traces.

Bear traps from America, bear dogs from Finland, bear hunters from Bavaria -- all of them are still no match for Bruno. The brown bear, officially known as "JJ1" once again made an appearance near the south-eastern town of Bad Tölz on Thursday evening not far from where he received a glancing blow from a car on Wednesday night.

Not content merely to reignite the panic that has accompanied his every move over the past month, Bruno also took out yet another sheep on Thursday night in Bavaria -- adding to his total of over 30 dead sheep, a handful of slaughtered chickens and a pair of munched bunnies.

[Atlantic Bridge]

The last German bear was shot in 1835 in Ruhpolding/Bavaria. Therefore the first bear that entered Germany naturally is a big issue on our side of the Atlantic. And we seem to have bad luck since the bear is obviously quite agressive. He entered stables and does not behave like "normal" bears do.

The recent movements of the "problem bear" JJ1 (Bruno)

[Jeff Chandler]

Bavaria. That's the part of Europe my ancestors were run out of.

[Ruth A.]

Slap me and call me bad, but if they opened the job of killing the bear to American dogs and hunters, I think it could be done.

[Atlantic Bridge]

Killing is probably not the problem. The thing is that we want to take the bear alive. There are only very few bears in Europe left. Therefore we can not afford to kill them without a serious reason and we are resticted to try everything else first.

[freeplancer]

Do you want to touch my monkey?

[CarrotAndStick]

Bruno?

[Khurkris]

In Bad Tölz eh?
Methinks Ol Bruno might have picked a safer place to play in the wood.

http://www.sfahq.com/chap/65/

I don't know if Chapter 65 is still active or if they've closed down since the hats moved to Stuttgart.

Ahh never mind, the 10th is in Stuttgart
10th Special Forces Group (Airborne) Fort Carson, Colo. One battalion in Stuttgart, Germany (European Command)

[Atlantic Bridge]

I did lots of skiing in that area. When we were kids we had fun with the British mountain infantery that had to learn skiing there. They simply kicked them out of a helicopter into some tricky deep snow departures after letting them practise for a few days on normal slopes. Most of those boys from the East End in London never saw a ski before and naturally they had a hard hard time there.

Our "Schadenfreude" was limited since most of those Brits were really nice guys.

[Khurkris]

Sounds like a great time and great memories.

[Atlantic Bridge]

Sounds like a great time and great memories.

Yep! Although one of my closer friends died while hitting a tree while he was skiing I enjoy my memories of the Allgaeu. Anyway we were much better skiers than all appearing soldiers (no matter of their nation)...

[starbase]

Yep! Although one of my closer friends died while hitting a tree...

That's pretty common, isn't it? Representative Sonny Bono (of Sonny and Cher) died that way, so did one of the Kennedys.

That's one reason I don't ski, that and every winter you can see people hobbling around in crutches!

[Atlantic Bridge]

That's pretty common, isn't it? Representative Sonny Bono (of Sonny and Cher) died that way, so did one of the Kennedys.

We were crazy kids with no fear of any danger. Skiing is a safe sport if it is done responsible. Speeding down steep deep snow slopes through the forrest is fun but extremely unhealty. I did a lot of moronic things these days I would never do again nowadays since I am a family father that loves his existance in the meantime. When we go skiing today we only use safe descents.

BTW - the death of my 12-year-old friend was a real tragedy for his family. He was their only kid. Our local skiing club still celebrates a annual rememberance race for him. They do not know that he would have laughed about that since he hated such "offical" BS... Probably he is smiling while I am writing this.

[Nailbiter]

ping,,,,,,,, maybe we can export some of our spare bears to Europe, LOL
see #4

[Juan Medén]

It's probably just as well that the Germans and Austrians are not fighting with us in Iraq.

[Atlantic Bridge]

What has Iraq to do with bears?

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

If you want wild bears to live, you have to tolerate a few score dead sheep per year. ( 1 score = 20, as in "Four score and seven years ago").

[R.W.Ratikal]

When I first read the headline "Bruno" I thought it was apiece about Hillary.

[toddlintown]

Bad Tölz. Beautiful area.

[Jimmy Valentine]

That is an interesting track. Do bears usually have such a large migratory pattern?

[GladesGuru]

Give a bear a garbage dump with a cave to hibernate in, and a mate, and it will wander nowhere. Just step lively when dropping off your garbage!