What a country ours! Authorities capable only of postponing any decision, and then of always taking the most abstruse ones, inconclusive when not useless ... but which are very smoky for public opinion! The history of the Marsican Bear is increasingly becoming emblematic of this Italianity devoid of logic and practical sense that has made us famous in the world. If a satellite were to fall one day, and if the satellite were to hit a Marsican bear, all attention would turn to this problem: bills to prevent overflight of PATOM areas, monitoring of all satellites at risk of falling, perhaps with the installation of "patriots" that intercept falling satellites or parts of them! Here, this is to ridicule it, but also to highlight the method by which problems are generally dealt with in Italy (the latest example was the proposal of anti-bear barriers along the highways and the spread of signs to avoid collisions on streets, rather than wondering why the bear crosses the streets more than it once did).
A bear died of supposed bovine TB (although science tells us that TB is often the result of other evils, such as malnutrition), and TB immediately becomes a primary or only problem, although no trace recent is identified among the pets supposed "carriers" of the disease. Too tasty the news, however, to set it aside, given that it lends itself to push the authorities to prohibit grazing by hated farmers, now in the eyes of public opinion guilty of all wickedness, rather than seeing the positive aspect for the maintenance of biodiversity. pastures and the indirect contribution to the food needs of bears, wolves and foxes and vultures and golden eagles.
Some time ago another disease at risk for the Marsican bear appeared, the pseudorabbia, but this was immediately made to forget, put in the news not to be given and much less to be disclosed (other than specific interviews with experts and authorities!). Because? Simple, this disease can only be fought with vaccinations and the help of as many hated hunters (enemies of the bear regardless!) To reduce the presence of wild boars, healthy carriers. So, better not talk about it and throw yourself all on the latest case of death for supposed bovine TB, which allows you to attack the breeders. And to field other research and studies apparatus, that circus that has already burned 15 million euros without any construct (at least for the bear), because this seems to want to start the Ministry of the Environment, which according to the latest news already speaks of "working groups", "strategies" and ... only the inevitable "plans".
But the Marsican Bear problem is over half a century old, and it is to those roots that the current problems (never resolved and always postponed!) Must be traced. Those problems, always the same, which still arise today, only with different facets. To return to today, May-June 2014: the problem is not the breeders' corers, but why the bear goes to look for these corers, constantly crossing the "dangerous" roads, ridiculously signaled to tourists, which increasingly they frequent precisely because they are attracted by the possibility of making easy observations of bears, now more and more domestic and, therefore, "problematic" (another nice problem that has immediately created jobs for the "solvers"!). Obviously there is (there would be!) No need for further research to understand the reasons; except that there is no worse deaf than those who do not want to hear.
Too simple, banal and not profitable for researchers and scholars to sow corn fields, graze flocks of sheep, reserve oases of peace for the bear, reduce the competitive presence of wild boar and deer. In America, this they would do. In Italy these proposals are considered unscientific! And woe to putting them into practice, if ever they really prove to be decisive, with the risk of stopping that merry-go-round that has already devoured 15 million euros in studies and research!
Frank Zunino
Secretary General of the Italian Wilderness Association
(June 3, 2014)
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