Lily with microphone in den Both Jewel and Lily are now sleeping with their microphones. Jewel and family managed to unplug their microphone, leaving Lily Fans with just a loud hum to turn down or off.
Mic tube tucked in brush on left; cub climbing Lily on rightWe thought we were clever with Lily’s microphone—tucking it into the brush pile so it wasn’t obvious. But bears don’t miss much and Lily is a bear. She spied it while she was out today and easily plucked it out and immediately backed into her den with her treasure. 
Lily backs into den with mic tubeShe played with it long enough to work the foam windscreen off the mic, and then chewed the cables before losing interest…for now. Fortunately it is still working.
With emergence so close, we don’t want to visit the dens to remedy problems. And any ‘fix’ at this point would most certainly be un-fixed in short order. Once the bears become active in spring, the equipment is completely at their mercy.
Ted sits with his feet in his bowlAt the Bear Center, Ted was more active than usual, so the staff decided it was his turn to roam if he wished. They closed the door to Lucky's enclosure and opened the door to Ted's. We saw Ted come down to the gate a couple times but mostly he has been back in his enclosure resting in his den.
Lucky in his enclosureThe staff continued their experiments with water. Throughout the winter, the bears showed no interest in water, and any water the staff brought them quickly froze. The past couple weeks, the staff has been bringing water to the bears when temperatures were above freezing. Still little or no interest. They began feeding the bears. 
Cubs outside the denToday they brought water again. Ted took a sip. Lucky and Honey ignored theirs. Lucky tipped his over. The staff refilled it. Same story.
Why don’t they want to drink when they have shown a need for water all winter by eating snow?
Lily relaxesWe think their shrunken stomachs are the reason. At the Bear Center, unlike zoos that feed bears all winter to keep them active for visitors, we let the bears mimic the wild bears by going months without food and water. The bears settled down into a state of reduced metabolism and (most importantly for the water question) their stomachs shrunk.
Ellie and Eli bond by tongue-lickingIn the wild, Lily and the cubs take in small amounts of water by licking drops off each others’ fur. They lick icicles, and they eat a little snow, but they have no need for larger amounts of water. There is nowhere they could find water in the frozen north, and there is no place they could put it with their shrunken stomachs. 
Lily pulls more mic cable into denAs spring progresses, they eat more and more. Their stomachs expand. Water becomes available with the melting snow. Then we see wild bears sipping water from puddles of meltwater as they ramp up their metabolisms toward full activity in time for green-up.
Lily licks stickThe staff is keeping records of food and water consumption like never before, building a database to compare with the activities of wild bears. They’ve started feeding earlier than would occur in the wild, so the desire to drink may return earlier than in the wild, as well.
Cub climbs on Lily's backThe picture of Lucky’s tongue last night reminded us that the BFF Team (Bear Facts and Fun Team) wrote a nice piece on tongues, complete with some eye-popping pictures of unbelievable tongues at http://tinyurl.com/Long-Tongues.
Dark-eyed Junco (file photo)Another sign of spring today was the first dark-eyed junco (Junco hyemalis). The junco picture here is just to show what a junco looks like and is not of the individual seen today.
Two videos from inside Lily's den today are Part I http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a5a5nKmFryM, and Part II http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zo4hayVHeVk. One of today's PTZ footage will be posted later tonight or tomorrow at http://youtube.com/bearstudy.
Thank you for all you do.
—Lynn Rogers and Sue Mansfield, Biologists, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center
All photos taken today unless otherwise noted.