Daniel MacIsaac
Northern News Services

NNSL (Aug 06/99) - Peter Esau says he had no choice but to kill a polar bear on the streets of Sachs Harbour last week.

Esau, mayor of the Banks Island hamlet, said he killed the bear early last Thursday morning after it had run up toward a group of homes standing beside the beach -- the bear's sixth foray into town in the course of a week.

"We had to shoot him because he just kept coming back," said Esau on Friday. "He was a really young male bear who must have just separated from his mother this spring -- and he wasn't hungry, but was curious and a nuisance -- and dangerous."

Esau said Sachs Harbour residents guessed the bear was about two years old. He said that while it's not so unusual for the community to see bears around the hamlet -- this one acted differently.

"They usually come in when there are ice floes," he said, "but the big bears never stick around."

It was a young male polar bear that entered a camp and killed an elderly woman outside Rankin Inlet just last month.

Martha Kudlak confirmed the Sachs Harbour encounter was unusual. Post mistress for the hamlet, Kudlak said she had first seen the bear down by the beach earlier in the week and then on Wednesday morning was woken up by the shouts of her husband, Frank.

"I went outside and the bear had come into our backyard, and I started yelling at it," she said. "It was the first time I saw a bear so close."

Kudlak said the bear had come within a few yards of the family's husky puppy and, again, appeared more curious than hungry.

"He was a fat, round polar bear and I was close enough to see his eyes," she said, "and he looked almost friendly -- I mean he didn't even try to attack the puppy."

Nevertheless, Kudlak said the family understood the danger the bear posed to the hamlet's children and elders, and to themselves. She said her husband fired two warning shots over the bear's head and, with the help of several neighbours on all-terrain-vehicles, got it running back to the beach.

Kudlak said she ran back inside the house and telephoned hamlet nurse Peggy Lucas.

"I was too excited and scared and forgot who I should call," she said, laughing at the memory, "so I called the nurse and then Peter Esau."

It was when the bear came back for more, at 2 a.m. the following morning, Esau said he had no choice but to shoot it -- firing just one shot from a rifle fitted with a scope.

Esau said that in its own way, however, the story had a happy ending. He said the bear that had proved such a menace to the community finally came to serve it -- the carcass was immediately butchered and its hide was preserved so that money will be raised for the hamlet through its sale. Finally, the mayor said the bear made for tasty eating.

"I had some," he said, "it was good."