Modelling the effectiveness of bear--proof garbage bins deployed at the community scale

人类与野生熊之间的相互作用所引起的冲突是管理层的一个重要问题 和居民一样。人类倾向于在谷底定居，原因与这些地区 也是熊的主要栖息地这种空间重叠自然地创造了一种情况， 熊很常见虽然熊和人类可以和平共处，但问题确实会发生， 随着人类继续在熊的栖息地建立定居点，这种问题的频率增加。熊在附近 人类社区被人类食物所吸引，因为食物往往含有高热量 相对容易收获（例如，在后院冷却器中的鲑鱼比鲑鱼更容易“捕捉” 在溪流中游泳）。然而，由此产生的熊和人类的密切接触， 人类和饥饿的熊在寻找容易获得的卡路里时会造成相当大的财产损失。的母熊 已经变得咄咄逼人，习惯了人们被消灭，但即使是这种激烈的解决方案也是暂时的， 因为引诱剂还在，另一只熊会紧随其后。研究表明 通过防止熊进入， 人类垃圾防熊垃圾箱在荒野公园很常见，但在美国还没有被广泛采用。 住宅水平。虽然这样的垃圾箱存在，但目前还不清楚熊将如何应对在 社区规模，或者社区将获得什么样的成本效益。在这个项目中，我们将使用一个模型， 方法来确定在社区规模部署防熊垃圾箱的有效性，使用 惠斯勒作为我们的样本社区。该模型将包括熊对天然食物的反应 和人类垃圾，将与我们的行业合作伙伴Maddocks Engineering合作开发。我们 旨在创建一个建模工具，可用于准确估计采用 防熊垃圾桶在不同的水平，从非常小的采用到认真使用的 社区里每个人的垃圾桶。

Conflicts arising from interactions between humans and wild bears are a significant concern to management and residents alike. Humans tend to settle in valley bottoms, for many of the same reasons that these areas are also prime bear habitat. This spatial overlap naturally creates a situation where interactions between humans and bears are common. While bears and humans can coexist without incident, problems do occur and the frequency of such problems increases as humans continue to establish settlements in bear habitat. Bears near human communities are attracted into the communities by human food, as it tends to be of high calorie content and relatively easy to harvest (e.g. salmon in a backyard cooler is much easier to ``catch'' than salmon swimming in a stream). The resulting close proximity of bears and humans however, poses safety risks to humans, and a hungry bear can cause considerable property damage in its quest for easy calories. A bear that has become aggressive and accustomed to people is exterminated, but even this drastic solution is temporary, as the attractants remain and another bear will follow on the heels of the exterminated one. Research indicates that the frequency of human-bear conflicts could be significantly reduced by preventing bears from accessing human garbage. Bear-proof garbage bins are common in wilderness parks, but have not been widely adopted at the residential level. While such bins exist, it is not yet clear how bears would respond to bins adopted at the community scale, or what cost benefits would accrue to the community. In this project, we will use a modelling approach to determine the effectiveness of bear-proof garbage bins deployed at the community scale, using Whistler as our sample community. The model, which will include bear movement in response to natural food and human garbage, will be developed in collaboration with our industry partner, Maddocks Engineering. We aim to create a modelling tool that can be used to accurately estimate the costs and benefits of adopting bear-proof garbage bins at various levels, ranging from very minimal adoption to the conscientious use of the bins by everyone in the community.