8-year-old PeteAfter days of failure in getting bears in the woods to come for a food reward to change their GPS batteries and not seeing a bear anywhere for many days, a male bear finally visited the Research Station this evening. We scrambled to get a good enough look to identify him. Sue noticed a slight diagonal scar between his eyes and thought perhaps it was Pete. We checked for the scar behind his right shoulder from a broad-head arrow back in 2007. Bingo!
Pete is from June’s first litter in 2005. Pete knows Sue well from the many hours she spent walking with June in 2005, and he calmly followed her to the scale to be weighed. His visit was in the dark. He doesn’t need color vision to find food here, but color vision helps in finding berries in the woods. Like the other bears, he’s eating berries by day and left a large scat to prove it—blueberries (Vaccinium sp.) and juneberries (Amelanchier sp.). Unlike most other bears, he made a visit to a feeding station.
Ice cream - Yum!It was uplifting to enter the Eagles Nest Town Hall tonight for the ‘Ice Cream Social’ and be spontaneously cheered as we entered. People gathered around to offer support. And this is in the community where the DNR says there is a public safety issue. There is not. If there were, it would seem there should have been an attack or two during the 50 years people have been hand-feeding bears here. If there were, it would seem there should be a few bears sighted instead of person after person saying they haven’t see a bear this summer.
Much of the day was spent with reporters. They are starting to ask more insightful questions and we’re working to take advantage of the opportunity to educate the public about black bears.
We thank you again for the support you are showing in so many ways, including the legal fund at bearstudy.org (not bear.org).
A video of June’s cubs taken on July 8, 2013 is posted at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90IT5r0kD6c.
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.