Verona: Luis, the oldest Andean bear in Europe, has died
Less than a month to go and he would have completed 30 years. But the disease that had struck his heart and lungs took him away within a handful of days, leaving him on the evening of December 13 to fall asleep for the last time. Luis, the oldest Andean bear in Europe, has died Bahia’s life partner for 28 years. He lived in Natura Viva park in Bussolengo (Verona).
Unique in Italy, the two represented a longevity records never equaled by any other zoological facility.
“Vulnerable” to extinction according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, Luis belonged to a species that reached the headlines thanks to the cinematography of thePaddington Bear.
Now, as per tradition for the animals that in life represented the heart of the fight against extinction at Parco Natura Viva, Luis will live a second time at the Trento Science Museum. With Blanco, the white lion and Toby, the rhino.
In the meantime, Bahia is being monitored, who has not deliberately gone outside these days and has gone to look for him in her bed.
“He lived a long life during which he saw the vet on very rare occasions,” he explains Camillo Sandri, zoological director of Parco Natura Viva, «But for a few days his caretaker Neda, who has been taking care of him and Bahia for more than 10 years – had warned us that he moved with difficulty and ate listlessly, in spite of his incurable gluttony. provided booked an in-depth visit at the veterinary hospital in Lodi but our friend preferred not to wait any longer, saying goodbye to us where he lived all his life».
From the good-natured air, lazy and sleepyhead but sufficiently shrewd to have his company do all the work of recovering the enrichments at the top of the trunks and then shamelessly stealing the swag, Luis was for Bahia a stainless accomplice. «We will also keep her monitored», continues Sandri, «very old and now left alone. We’ll have to give her time to deal with her loss. But we are proud to have given these two specimens the best life we could, yes parents of Balù and Tunkcurrently two of the 52 Andean bears in Europe, in turn parents of a new offspring».
Precious offspring, since it is a species that lives only in the Andes, the only bear in South America, massacred by deforestation which operates through the capture of small orphans of mothers killed by poachers. Fewer than 20,000 survive in Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela, besieged by the conversion of forests into agricultural land. Just like in the Paddington Bear movie.
The park
Parco Natura Viva has been supporting the conservation project of the Fundación Oso Andino in Ecuador. Not only scientific research conducted in its natural habitat to understand its behavior and ecology but also recovery of injured or orphaned bears, rehabilitation and release into the wild.
Parco Natura Viva bought several radio collars useful for monitoring specimens living in the wild, while for Italian children it has produced the publication “Lo scarabeo d’oro”. The fable that tells the vicissitudes of three animals (including an Andean bear) who try to find a peaceful place to live after their forest has been destroyed by man.