A man was forced to eat his dog after he was lost in the Canadian wilderness when a bear ransacked his campsite and wrecked his canoe.

Marco Lavoie, a 44-year-old climber from Quebec, was on a 3-month solo hike through the unspoiled forests when the bear attack left him isolated without any food and with no forms of transport.

His pet German shepherd was his companion for the hike and chased the bear away, but the dog was his last chance of food and to ward off starvation.

When Lavoie was finally rescued from Nottaway River near Montreal he had had hypothermia, had lost half of his body weight, and was too weak to speak.