Lily and Hope did some wandering around early this morning, but then the wind picked up and they spent the rest of the day near their bed. They played, practiced climbing, and might have broken branches to get catkins—but their activity was confined to the few trees around their bed site. By the time the family leaves this bed and moves to one by a big tree, the cubs will be well practiced at climbing compared to Hope last year.
However, this evening the wind calmed and the bears became active—racing around, climbing trees, and playing. Hope made a trip to the den and drank from the pool of water there.
We wish the PTZ camera could pan up higher! We heard the familiar sound of ‘claws on bark’ but couldn’t find the bears. Finally we spotted Lily descending a tree as we panned. Hope was up the same tree and came down later. Lily visited the den area too, but hurried back when a cub cried. We panned around and caught a good sighting of a cub—likely Faith.
The inch or two of snow that fell over the last couple days mostly melted by this afternoon.
Looking through the bushes, we wish we could see better. We thought about moving the camera, but it’s unlikely they will remain at this bed for long without a big escape tree nearby. We’re afraid that if we went out and they moved we wouldn’t know if they moved on their own or because of us. We remember Hope running for the den when she heard the snowmobile far away a few days ago. That wasn’t a problem then because they were all in and out anyway. But in this temporary bed, we’d rather avoid disturbance to see what they naturally do.
The Den Cam is requiring minimal maintenance now. Temperatures are warm enough that we don’t have to worry about the heater and about snow accumulating on the solar panels, so, barring another bite to the camera cable, we can stay away until they move to a secure tree where they would be more likely to stay put.
We found out that the program that aired in Germany today was a shortened version of Bearwalker. The way it was shortened apparently didn’t lose its impact from the emails we received from Germany and Austria.
We spent most of the day working with data and exhibits again, still eating food you sent for the birthday party. Much appreciated!
With a whopping vote of over 15,000, you leapfrogged Ely into 5th place in the Readers Digest contest earlier today, but Cresent City, CA has since retaken 5th place. To vote 10 times in a row each day, the link is http://wehearyouamerica.readersdigest.com/town.jsp?town=ELY&state=MN .
Thank you for your patience with our lack of ability to create videos. We hope to have a new on posted later tonight! Please check for recent ‘bearstudy’ video uploads on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/user/bearstudy#g/u.
Thank you for all you are doing.
—Lynn Rogers and Sue Mansfield, Biologists, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center