CHURCHILL (Canada): Every fall, this Hudson Bay port town in Canada’s Manitoba Province becomes a stopover for more than 500 polar bears on their annual migration towards the bay’s frozen northern icebank, comfortably sharing the space with local villagers.

“We have learned to cohabit,” said Churchill Mayor Michael Spence, who has hyped the annual bear gathering into a top travel destination that attracts over 15,000 tourists a year.

“The bears can wander into town at any time,” he said.

“You are in polar bear country,” warns a pamphlet from the National Parks and National Historic Sites.

Wandering the outskirts of town unarmed is not recommended. But the bears are protected, and only those deemed by authorities to be dangerous — an average of two a year — are shot and killed.

The Center of Studies on Northern Churchill, isolated in the barren tundra, has heavy protective grating on the windows and exterior doors remain closed at all times.

The town garbage dump, renamed in a travel brochure the “Polar Bear Dining Room,” welcomes busloads of tourists who come to ogle the bears as they scavenge for food.

The polar bear presence here can be traced back to the 17th century when Danish explorer Jens Munk became the first European to spend the winter in the town (1619-1620).

Englishmen from Hudson’s Bay Company later opened a fur farm in York, some 250 kms away, selling about 100 furs a year.

The presence of the bears is far from reassuring, with the biggest ones easily 600 kilos (1,500 pounds) and as tall as an elephant when standing.

But the polar bear is also a lifeline for Churchill’s 950 inhabitants where tourism represents 60 per cent of the town’s economy.—AFP