Unfortunately, Hope was also unmarked and uncollared, having nothing on her body to distinguish her from any other bear. On Yahoo, the comments about the article that tell of her death are quite polarized, with hunters bashing the bear-lovers, and the bear lovers bashing the hunters. Its foolishness! I did leave a comment, stating that if they valued the bear, then she should have been marked. Someone replied that she had been collared, twice, but slipped the collars. To me, scientists need a different solution, a permanent and inexpensive way to mark all research bears and other specifically studied wildlife.
I believe this solution already exists. While I do not know if it has ever been tried on a bear before, freeze branding is an inexpensive way already used to permanently mark cattle, horses, and dogs, and I suspect it would work wonderfully on a bear!
Instead of using a hot brand, the branding iron is soaked in either liquid nitrogen or dry ice, then applied to an area on the animal that has dark hair, but has been shaved. The skin is frozen with the brand. When the hair in the freeze branded spot grows back, it is white wherever the skin was burned. If the freeze brand was an '8', then a clear '8' grows back in white hair, standing out quite obviously against the surrounding dark hair.
Some animal right activists might complain that the branding would cause pain to the bear. I have two things to say to this.
#1 My son got a large wart frozen off his leg earlier this week...and he said it didn't hurt, and still doesn't hurt.
#2 Even if it does hurt to be freeze branded...I suspect it hurts less than getting shot! If the bear was able to choose a brand or death...I know what they would choose.
I believe freeze-branding wild research animals could save a lot of time, money, and aggravation by saving the research animals lives. Quit the griping, people, and just solve the problem!
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