JuneJune needed a GPS swap today so Sue decided to spend the day with her to count cubs and hopefully sex them as well. After swapping out her GPS and tightening her collar a notch, Sue followed June hoping she would head back to her cubs. June went from tree to tree grunting for her cubs. It seemed as though she hadn’t a clue where they were. She finally climbed to the very top of a large cedar—perhaps to catch their scent. Soon after her climb, she found them high in a huge white pine.
June's bed treeJune has 2 cubs. One has a very light face and seems braver, while the other has a darker face and is shyer. That’s all we know for now. After many hours of waiting, both cubs came down—but neither set foot on the ground. The shyer one glanced in Sue’s direction then got huffy and scampered back up the tree. The other soon followed.
June's cubs 60 feet up white pineJune knows Sue from their 9 years of working together. What does a wild bear do when it really knows someone? Ignore him or her. People are not part of their lives. June has her wild agenda of taking care of her family, being alert to danger, and finding food. She trusts Sue.
Gaining full trust takes years, and Sue has put in the time. June is a research partner whose job is to do what she does naturally. Sue’s job is to record her activities in the many ways modern technology allows plus the old fashioned ways—just watching, listening, and sometimes smelling. Just watching how a bear reacts to its surroundings is fascinating—the twitches of its nostrils, the direction of its ears, and where it focuses. Tiny sounds get their attention.
June sleeps as she waits for cubsWhen resting, hairs that move with heartbeats show heart rates in relation to season, surroundings, and types of sleep (Passive or REM). Some researchers implant heart monitors to get a complete picture of heart activity, but the bears in those studies don’t allow observation in the wild. With our trust-based methods, we don’t get detailed heart data, but we can get pieces of it along with quiet observations. It takes all kinds of research to get the whole picture. Nothing is perfect.
Jewel nursing yearlingsA Lily Fan sent an old link to a story about Professor Roger Powell who we mentioned in last night’s update http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2008/08/21-02.html. The story shows how Dr. Powell fits into our kinder, gentler ways of doing bear research. It also tells a bit of why we avoid traps, tranquilizers, and trauma like we do. Capture trauma can change bear behavior and research results. That’s part of why trust works so much better for the behavioral and ecological research we do. Building trust is a long process. That’s one reason not everyone can do trust-based research. It’s also a reason why we and the DNR ask hunters not to shoot radio-collared bears.
Jewel, Herbie, and FernEvery year these bears provide valuable data. Not only do they become more relaxed with the people they know, but their data histories make new data more meaningful because we know how they used the habitat and related to their neighbors in the past. Old bears carry a wealth of knowledge about their neighborhoods. In long-term studies, they reveal some of that.
UrsulaWe will write peer-reviewed papers to share the kinds of data that fit that format (travel patterns as revealed in new detail by GPS, den re-use, food habits, reproductive success, and a long list) and books where the stories can be put together in a way that truly reveals bears’ lives. Sue’s videos are treasures for the Bear Center and online. They reveal how bears live, just as the Den Cams reveal their hidden world to us all. Each format has its advantages in Education Outreach.
Jim Stroner checked on Jewel today and found she still has Fern and Herbie with her. He then checked on Ursula to see what is keeping her busy in such small areas. He found her feeding on snowfleas.
Birches and red maples are leafing out.
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.