Water jump
A bear is fishing in Kuril Lake, making an impressive jump in the water after a run in shallow water. Bears' fishing technique in Kuril Lake is unusual, different from the technique used in the creeks, especially when the number of salmons is limited: a bear stares the water from the beach, and when it sees a near salmon, it leaps in the deep water catching the fish directly with its mouth.
This year at the beginning of August there were very few salmons in the Kuril Lake: local scientists estimated 700.000 salmons instead of a normal number of 2.5/3.0 millions. It's not clear if this was caused by a delay in the arrival of the salmons, but I think it's more likely a real decay of the total number of salmons. The only river connecting the lake to the ocean is now used for fishing 6 days a week by a company producing canned salmon, reducing the arrival of salmons. In addition, the volume of tourists is increasing every year, bringing noise with helicopters and motorboats. The result is an increasing difficult in taking fishes for the bears, a tough competition, and also more nervousness and aggressiveness of the bears (in 2018 some incidents with bears happened). Kuril Lake is a unique paradise for bears (and for wildlife photographers too), but the industrial exploitation of salmons and the human impact of tourists risk to rapidly ruin this special oasis. Russian scientists are monitoring the situation, but we know that everywhere economic interests often prevail on nature preservation...
Paolo Barbarini, Italy, Busto Arsizio
