History is repeating itself. In 2009, pregnant Juliet arrived at her den site September 8. She then moved around a bit before finally settling in for the winter. This year, on September 9, Juliet bedded for several days in one area. She then wandered around a bit but returned to the bedding area. We wondered.
Today, we hiked in and found pregnant Juliet tucked in a den. At the entrance was a nice pile of moss she will undoubtedly rake into the den for bedding. As we approached, we saw beds and trails where she had spent the last several days. We also found a partially dug den about 12 feet away from her den. Juliet never said a bad word or made a bad face. Eventually, she came out. We removed her GPS unit but left her collar on. We’ll come back later to replace it with a narrow, lightweight collar like we gave Lily last fall. One down.
Braveheart remained close enough to where we found her collar yesterday that we were able to spot her and put it back on today. Phew!
Now, we’re waiting for Donna to be spotted somewhere. We are hopeful. Her cubs have not been spotted alone, so we are hoping she is just resting somewhere as her metabolism slows down. She has taken her collar off in past years and wasn’t spotted for as long as 11 months.
An unexpected surprise today was seeing 2-year-old Jewel and getting a collar on her. She slipped her radio-collar earlier this summer and this was the first opportunity we’ve had to get it back on.
June, Lily, and Lily’s family are safe as are all the other radio-collared bears as far as we know.
Yesterday’s rain helped slow the forest fire southeast of Ely. Rain is forecast for the next two days.
We are reading constructive criticisms and suggestions in your survey comments. Thank you for the help! That’s what we wanted.
Thank you for all you do.
—Lynn Rogers and Sue Mansfield, Biologists, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center