Lynn Rogers offers Lily a few grapes in exchange for adjusting the den camera.
First, the Den Cam. When Jim Stroner and Lynn trekked to the den today, Sue stayed back so Lily would have one less body to keep track of. As it turned out, snowfall overnight made back roads impassable for driving. Lynn and Jim weren’t dressed for miles of snowmobiling but had to continue. Waiting would make things harder with another snowfall in the forecast. Lynn hunkered down behind Jim on the snowmobile as Jim whizzed along in billowing snow in a beautiful but cold landscape. Three miles down the road, Jim’s eyelashes iced up so he couldn’t see. He thawed them out, and they continued. On an off road trail, branches drooped low under the heavy snow. Moving the branches slowed travel to a crawl and got the snowmobile stuck.
At the shed, they were doubly glad they came. Yesterday’s freezing rain and snow had covered the solar panels, making them useless. An hour of scraping got them going again.
Jim Stroner drives along a snowy trail.
Eventually, Jim and Lynn arrived at the den to find Lily much calmer than she was yesterday. She recognized Lynn’s voice and attire. She came out and sniffed his head for confirmation. Lynn gave her a handful of grapes so she would ignore him and Jim as Lynn adjusted the Den Cam and Jim attached the Pan-Tilt-Zoom (PTZ) camera to an ash tree 10-15 feet away. Engineers at PixController in Pennsylvania tried manipulating the PTZ camera remotely and realized a wire loosened during transport and needs to be re-attached before the camera can be controlled. Meanwhile, they will be building a low-power amplifier to supply “Phantom Power” to the microphone for louder sound. We hope the sound is full strength before the anticipated birth in a couple weeks.
Jim and Lynn said their usual thank you to Lily and left. Lily went back in her den and snuggled down by Hope. Back at the Research Center, we all could see the Den Cam needs further adjustment. Now that we can see how far back in the den the bears sleep, we can move it closer and slightly left during our next visit to the den.
Hope in the den!
Progress continues on Educational Outreach. The number of teachers who have submitted survey forms telling how they used the Den Cam in their classrooms has reached 435. A talented core of these educators (the Education Outreach Team) are making progress on the Black Bear Boxes, lesson plans, and a possible speakers’ bureau.
For research, a growing number of you are volunteering to help record detailed data on Lily and Hope for an hour a day, day after day, to maximize the scientific value of what we are seeing. More on that is coming shortly. This will be a particularly interesting year of den observations because of the potential for a new litter and the first opportunity to observe interactions of a mixed age litter in a den. The state of knowledge on that subject is summarized in this 2008 paper published in Ursus http://www.nrmsc.usgs.gov/files/norock/products/Swenson_Haroldson_2008.pdf .
On the book ‘Bear Tales’, 85 of you have now submitted your bear stories to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
Team Protect continues to work for protection of the radio-collared bears.
And your response to Team Bear’s matching donations is an amazing demonstration of our desire to learn and teach about bears together. We never dreamed that in less than a year together, the debt would fall from $700,000 to under $123,000. That’s over $577,000 that you donated and voted to enable the North American Bear Center to accomplish its mission.
With only a few hours left in this year, we say thank you from the bottoms of our hearts for all you have done this past year—for your friendship, your passion, and the many ways you have propelled bear research and education beyond what anyone dreamed.
This is a wonderful start to a Happy New Year!
Lynn Rogers and Sue Mansfield, Biologists, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center
