Ooty: The sloth bears of Coonoor, who were notorious for their house raids in search of honey stocked by farmers, are now increasingly targeting provision stores and feasting on biscuits, chocolate, and sugar. Recently, the visuals of a sloth bear breaking into a provision store at Boys Company, on the outskirts of Coonoor city, went viral on social media.
Interestingly, the animals seem to prefer old buildings with wooden shutters. As such incidents of shop break-ins increased, the shop owners in the region started installing CCTV cameras, suspecting a human hand behind all the thefts.
However, the footage revealed the real culprit- a sloth bear, which first created a gap in the wooden panels and then pulled out the shutters entirely.
According to V Rajanagam, councilor of Jagathala, a village near Coonoor, life has become a nightmare for the residents in the region as the sloth bear attacks occur regularly in the area. “Now they are targeting provision shops and bakeries operating in old buildings with wooden shutters”, he said. Just the other day ice creams were taken away from one shop and the following day another shop was broken into from where biscuits and chocolates were stolen, he added.
“We are at our wits’ end as we feel the forest department is incompetent to handle the situation”, he added. We will be forced to take to the streets as there has been no action from the forest department,” he added.
In the past few months, sloth bears have broken into 20 houses. Women were attacked, honey stocks were stolen, pedestrians ran for life and school children were scared away.
According to Ooty Divisional Forest Officer G Goutham, though traps were set up near the problem spots to catch the animals near the problem spots, only two bears have been caught so far. “We have been acting promptly after the reports of bear attacks, but with little success, ” he added.