What We Learned from the Incident
This is how the fifteen farmhouses on the frontier were arranged: they were centered on the Rokusensawa River which ran through the center of the frontier, with ten on the right or east bank and five on the left or west. The bear damaged all ten houses on the right bank, but all on the left bank were spared. Based on the season, this might have been because the bear did not want to ford the river in such a chill, or it might simply have been that the ones on the right were easier to get to.
It is worth noting that the bear attacked the Ōta house on three separate occasions: the 9th, 10th, and 12th. By this alone one can understand the tenacity of this beast. Between its visits on the 9th and 10th the bear left six dead and three wounded. However, one of the wounded, the gravely injured Umekichi, bore what has long been known as the difficult-to-treat “mark of the bear.” With each changing of the season the wounded areas festered anew, and less than three years later he passed on.
Including the unborn child in the death toll, the total number of dead rises to eight, with two left seriously wounded.
All ten houses which farmed chickens suffered damage. Besides bedclothes, which had all been destroyed, womens’ items had suffered particular damage. Many articles had even been taken outside: in particular, underclothes, underwear, hot rocks, and footwear. If we can accept the record as fact, it can be surmised that it acquired a taste for womens’ items at the first house it attacked and afterwards sought them out.
Miyoke Yūjirō, the one life spared among the nine dead, was drafted during the Second World War and died in action. His brother and sister, Rikizō and Hisano, exhausted themselves caring for their mother. On account of these actions, their mother Yayo lived out a full eighty-two years of life.
The injured Odo recuperated much sooner, and he left to labor in the snowy mountains. However, in April of the next year he got it in his head to take a shortcut on the way home from his work felling trees. Disregarding his partner’s unwillingness, Odo crossed the Rokusensawa River on a bridge of tree stumps behind the Miyoke house. Halfway across, Odo lost his footing and was swallowed up by the muddy river.
Looking back on the whole sequence of loss and injury, two facts become apparent. One: not a single horse, which was the most important thing to the people of the frontier after their own life, had been killed. Two: while the insides of houses had been torn through, not one had been set ablaze.
And though the Imperial Forest around the basin of the Sankebetsu River had long been known as a place frequently visited by bears, injuries had been low enough as to not be noticeable. Based on this feeling of security, the constant appearances of bears on the frontier had been disregarded and the establishment of counter-measures had been neglected. Counter-attacking with a group of gunmen and wounding the bear could be called a fundamental misstep. No cooperative system of extermination had been established, based in part on a belief at the time that “only hunters hunt.”
Another aspect which magnified the damage done by the bear was the ignorance towards bears’ habitats and behaviors. The bear considered the Ōta house, which it had attacked first, to now be its territory, and it would naturally return there until it had finished eating everything inside. The house should have been cleared of any bodies and anything edible as soon as possible after the attack. An experienced matagi hunter would be familiar with these measures. Another issue raised was the tardy delivery the guns and ammunition. Being that headquarters had been established three days after the first incident, it must be said, though the location was quite remote, that help arrived too late.
Some definite statements about the bear’s behavior and patterns have been made since the incident:
1. Shows no negative reaction to fire or lamps.
2. Will not go far while food it has left behind remains.
3. Appears many times in search of left behind food.
4. Conceals leftovers.
5. Tenacious appetite for familiar foods or items. Concentrated on getting corn on four separate occasions, and particular damage was noted to womens’ clothing.
6. Did not attack at any regular period of time.
7. No apparent regard for number of people present.
8. When attacking a person, tore off clothes and body hair.
9. When attacking, shifted focus to those fleeing.
10. Creatures who do not settle down for a harsh winter have voracious appetites.
11. The bear, wounded and having failed to enter hibernation, was starving, and revealed its true brutality.
It is now thought that Miyoke Hisano, who fled in a daze, and the unborn child, who were left alone after the initial attack, were saved not because the bear would not attack those who did not resist, or who played dead, but rather that because there was other food, and so the bear ignored them.