Hope shed last year’s fur and emerged a beauty. She has perhaps the most distinctively marked black bear face we have seen yet. The contrast between the dark bridge and light sides of her muzzle and the contrast between her narrow bright eyebrow patches against black fur set her apart. Faith is growing up to have a similar face. The two are going to be hard to tell apart in a couple years.
We got a good look at them both yesterday when the family cruised through the Research Center for the first time this year. They didn’t give us much time to look, though, as they had no interest in anything except sniffing around and pulling down a couple chokecherry trees with green cherries. Then they moved on.
Today, they were miles away in the clearcut near their den of this past winter. They were opening logs for ant pupae. They were on their way through that area, too, heading farther south to bigger clearcuts with even more logs and stumps to tear open.
Where did they get such distinctive dark muzzles? Lily has the same light sides to her muzzle but has a light bridge, too.
Thank you, too, for your support in ordering the 3-DVD set of the full-length BBC version of “The Bear Family & Me” at http://www.bear.org/website/gift-shop.html?page=shop.product_details&flypage=flypage_images.tpl&product_id=841&category_id=8 .
You are continuing to bring benefits to the area where the radio-collared bears live! What a solid lead you have maintained for Soudan Underground Mine State Park! Last year it was Bear Head Lake State Park and you made them the big winner. This year you are throwing the weight of Lily fans behind Soudan. To vote, go to http://www.livepositively.com/#/americasparks/leaderboard and vote over and over.
Thank you for all you do.
—Lynn Rogers and Sue Mansfield, Biologists, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center