CHRIS LAWRENCE TALKED WITH CHRIS RYAN, BEAR BIOLOGIST FROM THE DNR ABOUT THE FEATURE ON WEST VIRGINIA OUTDOORS. YOU CAN HEAR THAT SEGMENT IN THE "MEDIA CENTER"
Some West Virginia ingenuity will be featured on a popular History Channel segment this week. The show "Modern Marvels" is featuring different types of trapping this week and among the traps featured will be one in use by the West Virginia DNR.
"We have a throw-arm that all of our guys in Elkins at the operations center built for us." Said DNR bear biologist Chris Ryan. "It’s a piece of metal that goes in the ground. It’s spring loaded with a chain around a tree and a cable around its paw."
Most West Virginians are probably familiar with the culvert trap. The device can best be described as a "barrel on wheels." However, the trap featured on Modern Marvels is a snaring device that holds the animal until biologist can take his or her vital statistics, tattoo the bear and then release it unharmed.
The History Channel cameras came along for two days with Ryan and his team in the northern study area. The trapping grounds were in the Monongahela National Forest near the Randolph, Tucker, and Pocahontas County areas. The state animal of West Virginia didn’t disappoint.
"We ended up catching a radio collared sow and we had been working her den. She had two cubs in the den and the cubs were still with her and they were up the tree. They videotaped that. They also video taped the other three that we caught." Ryan said.
Ryan points out that bear trapping is illegal in every state except Maine. The DNR uses the snare traps to capture animals for research work. The snares are efficient because they can be set anywhere. The culvert traps are difficult to take into an area where there is no vehicle access and are typically only used for the trap and transfer of nuisance bears.
The Modern Marvels segment features about eight minutes of the West Virginia bears and will air Monday night at 8:00 and then re-air Tuesday night at 9:00.
Photo: Mark Schock