A Grizzly Inventory
by D. Grant DeMan
Having little else to debate, it seems the Province of British Columbia
suffers an unbearable state of anxiety over its grizzly bear population
count. The provincial Lands and Parks experts estimated tally is ten
to thirteen thousand, while environmental groups lay hold to a figure ten
thousand less. It's quite a spread.
So tax payers have shelled out multi-millions of dollars without
actually coming close to a definite figure. We find no one has roamed that
vast wilderness and actually counted bear noses. And even if they did,
who's to say they don't compute some bears two or three times over based on
the prevailing theory that the light is better over here, or just maybe
yonder mountain is less dangerous. Our trust in government to make such a
count is preposterous anyway, judging from the way it mangles financial
records.
Even I am aware of that old warehouse thieves' ruse of moving stock
around the room and recounting it in order to cover up the fact that most
of the stuff has been stolen. The old Inventory Shuffle.
And to rely on tree-huggers fantasies. Well? Here I picture the final
photo-op of the world's last bear family, zoomed around the world on CNN:
oh the blood and gore, the homeless cubs. Posed armies of redshirt gunmen
growling, "Git them damn critters 'afore they maul our womenfolk and
kiddies!"
As an aside I make mention of the political and social incorrectness
of the term, "grizzly bear." Many former inmates of prison work gangs
physically and psychologically impacted by brutal guards in the cranberry
swamps, referred to their overseeing Captains, as Grizzly Bears. Now mere
whispers of the fateful phrase is sure to evoke traumatic whip and gun
visions. We must then show a some sensitivity.
To get on track I phoned my old buddy Professor Daubabear Rosenbleu of
Bruinashee University: "What are we going to do about this, Dauby? Seems
folks can't or wont accurately count grizzlies."
"Yes. I am pissed to my PHD's that they haven't consulted me, or one of
my colleagues. During the summer Bear Inventory Workshop of 1969, convening
with sociologist Dr. Doya Nosetally and his graduate inventory specialists,
we came up with a foolproof plan for just this very endeavor."
"So what is the answer. How would you count bears?"
"Elementary, dear dumbkopf. We address a current social issue with an
accurate inventory of those grouchy beasts for pennies, not millions of
dollars. You will notice that the economic policy of the government has
littered our highways with poor souls who claim they will work for food."
"Sad, but true.""We recruit them. Give them all the beans and
rice they can stomach, and send them fully equipped into our wild
province: each shall be given two cans of Day-Glo paint - one pink and one
blue. Got that?"
"Sort of, Professor. Pink and blue paint. Girl and boy. Female and
male. What else?"
"Two paint brushes, you idiot's delight."
"Oh, I'm beginning to get it."
"Go to the head of the blithering class. During a bear-sex briefing,
our recruits are instructed in brushing grizzly noses with appropriate
colors. These special paintbrushes, designed and patented by Nosetally and
I, have a built-in foolproof counter only functional upon the presence of
fresh bear DNA. Each click is satellite-relayed to University homebase, and
transformed into governmental Bureauspeak."
"I see. When a worker finds a colored-nosed bear, they know it has been
counted, and move on."
"But there is also a fail-safe device. You see the environmentally neutral
paint negates DNA detection and the brush wont respond. No way can we count
a bear twice."
"Sounds like a fine plan. Each bear actually becomes inventoried for
life. Saves money and time, gives work to the unemployed and dissolves the
controversy between conflicting grizzly groups."
"And that, my brain-lapsed friend, is precisely why it shall never be
adopted.""You mean..."
"No one really wants to know how many bears lurk out there.
Certainty, my friend, is the enemy of controversy. Tell me, where are the
Flat Earth editorialists now that the true shape of the world has been
determined? You want to put a whole legion of bearcare folks out of
business? No, we'll never know for sure how many grizzlies crap in the
woods. Or even if they do."
"A pity."
"No, bearbrain! It's an industry."
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