Given the growing concern over the increasing number of bears in forests, representatives from the programme Bez Tabu travelled to Žīguri, a village in the Balvi Municipality near where a bear attacked a person in mid-March this year. After interviewing local residents, it is clear that while people theoretically know how to behave in the event of a bear attack, many doubt whether they would be able to remain calm if the situation were to occur.

A hunter named Ivars, approached by the journalists, experienced a very real encounter with a bear: “The bear is spotted quite often in these quarters. Both tracks and I myself managed to encounter it last year. I was out trapping beavers with my son, and about 20 metres from me, the bear rose up on its hind legs. There were raspberry bushes in front of me; the bear was behind them, and we had not seen each other before that. I realised I could not run, and in that moment, my whole life flashed before my eyes.”

Representatives from Bez Tabu also sought the opinion of Jānis Ozoliņš, a leading researcher and zoologist at the Latvian State Forest Research Institute Silava. The researcher stated: “It is better not to go to the forest in March and April! There is no need to creep into the depths of the forest.”