On my youtube site someone asked me if I had ever heard of any reports of Sasquatch observed in or around public garbage dumps?  That got me thinking, as I have noticed a change in such reports since the 1980s.

I have spoken to witnesses who claimed to have seen a Sasquatch rummaging through human garbage but every story that I am aware of is now at least 30 years old.  There are a few more recent ones where the subject was observed rummaging through people’s garbage cans but these too have been few and far between.

So I wondered, ‘Why have reports of this creature in garbage dumps stopped?’  The answer became clear, at least here in Western Canada (Alberta and BC).

In the early 1980s, various levels of government decided that the long standing practice of open pit dumps would end.  The main reason for this decision at the time was the increasing number of what was officially known as ‘spoiled bears’.  Bears that became so used to easy picking of human food in the dumps that such scavenging had become the norm.

A spoiled bear can quickly become an aggressive problem bear when that food source is cut off.  This became a huge issue in 1980 when a large, problem Grizzly, which was a known garbage feeder, killed one man and seriously mauled another in Banff National Park.  The National, and later the Provincial Parks, led the way in shutting down the open pit dumps – a rule communities soon followed suit.

There was a period of time for the bears to go though a sort of, ‘No easy pickings, withdraw’, but today nobody even remembers the outcry.  Remember when suddenly one could  just drive to the local dump and drop off a bag or two for free?  Or going to the dump in the early hours of the morning to do some bear watching?  This was the norm.  So, of course, there were a few reports of other creatures seen in and about the dumps, too.

Today, the dumps are like little forts!  High fences all around; steel containers; everything separated for recycling; or everything trucked in or out; staff there almost ’round the clock to keep an eye on things.  And the biggest change of all: trash is now weighed and you have to pay to leave it there!  No bears anymore – just ravens, crows and seagulls.  At least that is the way of it here, where I live, in Mission, British Columbia.

So, to conclude, I feel even though there were a few reports in the past of Sasquatch in and around community open pit garbage dumps, that has indirectly become a thing of the past – like the dumps themselves, for the most part.

Thomas Steenburg