GOING UP | Lumby residents facing slight tax increase to add funds to capital reserve in 2014 [A6]
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Wednesday, January 8, 2014 P R O U D L Y
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Cause of death unclear
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ROGER KNOX Morning Star Staff
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Julie Funfer and her dogs, Ranger and Porsche, go for a walk with her mom Angela Chisholm, and her dog Tebo, in the sunshine Saturday at Marshall Field in Okanagan Landing.
Foul play is not suspected in the death of a Gateway Shelter client Sunday. The Vernon man, believed to be in his early 50s, was visiting the shelter at around 2:30 p.m. He was at the top of the shallow set of stairs which lead to the facility’s resource room, in the basement, when he fell. “The man was transferred quickly by ambulance to Vernon Jubilee Hospital, and he was then transferred to Kelowna General Hospital where he died at 8 p.m.,” said Barb Levesque, executive director for the John Howard Society which operates the shelter. Levesque said the man was alone at the time, and video footage of the incident has been turned over to the RCMP and to the coroners office. The man’s name has not been released. The death is the latest in what Levesque calls a “really rough year” for deaths of clients and former clients of the society. “It’s a really sad event when any of our clients pass away but this has been a particularly difficult year in terms of death,” said Levesque. “We have a sense it’s more than 10 people in the last 12 months.” A spokesperson for the coroners service confirmed the death and said the cause is still under investigation.
Conservation officers advising caution Conservation officers are again calling for Coldstream residents to keep an eye on their house pets and livestock following another cougar sighting on the weekend. Officers destroyed one female cougar after trapping it near Kinloch Drive Thursday, and a male cougar was put down in Lavington Saturday after the animal killed two goats. Officers have also received a report of a cougar attempting to kill a Jack Russell terrier at a home on Husband Drive.
On Sunday, officials received four or five calls in regards to the sighting of a cougar near Tebo and Kirkland Drives, not too far from Kidston Elementary School. The cat was also observed walking onto a porch. “It’s normal cougar behaviour in an unnatural environment,” said North Okanagan conservation officer Ken Owens Monday. Traps were set for the animal and were being monitored, though Owens said there had been no more reported sightings of the cougar. With its proximity to the Cougar Canyon
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Ecological Reserve and Kalamalka Lake Provincial Park, Coldstream is a prime cougar habitat close to where people live and where prey such as deer also reside. The cougar sightings, said Owens, are not too alarming. “We just want people to do everything they can to protect their pets and livestock,” he said. “Those are similar shape and size to a cougar’s natural prey. If they get the opportunity to kill domesticated animals, they will. “Pets don’t have the instincts of wild animals and they become an easy food source.
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We don’t want that learned behaviour to develop in a cougar. They are a highly intelligent animal.” A necropsy performed on the cougar trapped and killed near Kinloch Drive, said Owens, showed the animal had dog hair in its belly, proving it had been feeding on a domestic animal and most likely killed it. There have been eight recorded fatalities involving cougars killing humans in 100 years, and, on average, there are less than one injury attack per year by a cougar on a person.
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ROGER KNOX Morning Star Staff
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