Scientists and environmentalists clash as Slovenia prepares for bear cull

A brown bear recently attacked a 59-year-old woman near her house in the Slovenian village of Škofljica. The mother bear was apparently trying to protect its cub from a human presence. 

While the woman fights for her life in a Ljubljana hospital, this rare attack could have wider consequences for the bear population: it's likely to change public opinion about the animal.

This spring, brown bear numbers in Slovenia reached their highest in history, putting Slovenia among Europe's top habitats for the carnivore. Estimates indicate that this small European country is home to over a thousand bears. 

Scientists and environmentalists are now clashing in Slovenia, with the former claiming there's a need to cull at least a fifth of them while the latter suggest that humans should let nature balance itself and reduce the number of bears on its own. 

The area that hosts the largest number of brown bears in Slovenia is in the thick forests next to the town of Kočevje. We joined a local forest patrol riding in an off-roader to monitor the camera that records wildlife activity at the well-known watering hole. 

Videos recorded have shown a deer, a bird and several bears - all of them relatively close to human settlements.

Nevenka Lukić Rojšek from the Public Institute for Tourism and Culture of Kočevje told CGTN that people and those large animals coexist in Slovenia relatively well.

"We are able to coexist with more than thousands of bears in Slovenia," said Nevenka. "For example, in Austria, our neighboring country, they don't have even one bear because the tolerance towards them is so low that the day when the bear crosses the border, it is immediately shot." 

But not everyone here is happy at coexisting with so many bears. Scientists say that 800 is the number of bears that can live in balance with nature and humans in the entire country. Everything above that number, according to them, is problematic.

Miha Marenče from Slovenia's Forest Service agrees. She told us: "Damage or conflict events begin to increase exponentially in populations with numbers above 800 bears. And this is why the expert opinion in the Republic of Slovenia is to support culling."

Close to Kočevje is the village of Škamevec, where Milan Podlogar, a local hunter and a forest ranger, had a number of encounters with bears. 

Podlogar took us to the forest nearby to show us an empty bear's den and told us that in the late summer bears often pay a visit to the villagers.

"The only thing that's unpleasant is when you come out of the house in the night and don't pay attention, you can meet a bear directly from just a couple dozen meters away. They also do some damage," Podlogar explained. 

"Not only because they pick up fruit under the trees, but also because they climb trees, break them, scratch the trunk and break branches. That's the main problem."