More snow! With temperatures around 32 F, snow came down hard this morning.
What would Lily and family do?
Accompanied by WCCO-TV (Minneapolis), we checked late morning as the snowfall was letting up. Lily et al. were in the same area as yesterday, but instead of being by a big pine for safety, they were in a thicket of young balsams for shelter. Homing in on Lily’s radio-collar, we found Hope in the process of tearing a rotting log apart for grubs. The three inches of snow apparently had stopped the search for snow fleas in the ground litter. Then we noticed Lily and Faith nearby under the balsams. The TV crew, the same crew that did the nice story about Lily and family back in February, got a nice shot of Lily lying on her back while Faith lay on her chest nursing from the usual anterior left nipple. She was sticking to her nipple even though Hope wasn’t around.
Hope had a play face, so Lynn put his fingers in her mouth to see how hard she might bite in play…nothing that would bruise. She is controlling her bite well.
Jo’s GPS signals are in a tight group, so she is probably holed up as well.
In the Readers Digest contest to win money for Ely, we have 536,684 votes, just 871 votes out of 5th place. The link to vote 10 times in a row each day through May 16 is http://wehearyouamerica.readersdigest.com/town.jsp?town=ELY&state=MN .
In the Chase contest to win money for the International Wolf Center, we are solidly in 3rd place. This is the contest where we can vote only once through May 4. To vote, go to this link http://www.facebook.com/ChaseCommunityGiving and click “Like.” Then go to this link http://apps.facebook.com/chasecommunitygiving/charities/411543539-international and register your vote for the International Wolf Center.
Dana Coleman’s first grade class initiated a petition to have the American black bear named Minnesota’s state mammal. This is an amazing opportunity for students across Minnesota to learn about their state government. The link to the class’s petition is http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/BlackBear-MNState-Mammal/.
Thank you for all you are doing.
—Lynn Rogers and Sue Mansfield, Biologists, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center