LilyThis afternoon, Sue hiked in to the den Lily, Ellie, and Eli shared this past winter. No bears. One of the two trail cams was askew and aimed for the treetops. The other cam was missing entirely but later spotted at the bottom of Lily’s 8-foot deep den. We look forward to viewing the video of its travels…once we are able to retrieve it!
Lily cautiously approachesLily’s radio-signal was close so the family hadn’t gone far. Lily appeared grunting to her cubs and blew by Sue to check the den. When she found her cubs weren’t there, she headed back in the direction she had come—still grunting. Once she made sure Ellie and Eli were okay, she returned and calmly lay down to eat nuts while Sue fitted her collar with a GPS case and GPS unit.
Bed on top of snow at base of pineSoon after the collar work was done, the cubs appeared in the distance and began approaching. They avoided Sue and went straight for the den. Lily followed. After eating snow near the entrance of the den, Lily slowly lowed herself into the den to join Ellie and Eli. Sue reoriented the trail cam, changed the SD card, and left. Hopefully now, with the camera realigned, we can learn more about what Lily and the cubs are doing.
Lily and yearlingsThe SD card had captured stills and video of the family’s activities on April 6 and 7 before the trail cam was dislodged. We were surprised to see all 3 bears had come out of the den about 10:30 PM on April 6 and romped around for nearly an hour before returning to the den. Some of that video has been posted at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Vrm1PEnaew. A short video of them playing is at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Z42-3SOBr0.
Lily coming out of denJuliet discombobulated her den cam on April 6 when she squeezed by it on her first excursion outside the den. The good placement to view winter den activities was too close for her to squeeze by without moving it; so subsequent viewing has been less than ideal. But we can see enough to know that she and the cubs are still at the den and are making daily excursions outside like we saw with Lily last year.
At the Bear Center, with melting snow, we could see where to put Honey’s new enclosure and how to expand Ted’s enclosure. When we were near Ted’s enclosure, he came to the fence with his sweet grunts of friendship, licked Lynn’s face, and ate a few Brazil nuts. What a sweetheart! Lucky showed no interest.
Lily and yearlingsLast night on ABC’s Nightline, the host plugged the new Disney Bear movie and interviewed Jane Goodall (http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/video/world-bears-23374494). They touted the movie for educating people about bears but also focused on the attack by a black bear on a Florida woman who encountered the mother and yearlings in her garage. We haven’t talked with the woman and don’t know details, but the attack sounded very much like a similar attack a few years back when a woman in Minnesota encountered a mother and cubs in the close quarters of her garage and was bitten and scratched by the defensive mother. 
Lily and yearlingsBoth sound like cases of mother bears being afraid of people, attacking defensively, and then running off once they vanquished the danger. We compare that to the absence of such behaviors in Eagles Nest Community where people and bears have co-existed for over 50 years. The only exception in those 50 years was a single swat by a mother that a man deliberately approached to within arms’ length in the dark. Not all mothers are the calm individuals that Lily, June, and few others are/were. These trusting bears would be the last to attack.
Lily pawingThe situation reminds Lynn of an encounter with a grizzly in Alaska where fearful grizzlies are prone to attack when startled but trusting grizzlies familiar with people do not. Lynn watched from a cliff as a grizzly made its way up a salmon stream. He carefully made his way down the cliff to photograph the approaching grizzly. It took him longer to descend than he anticipated and the grizzly was close when he reached the stream. The grizzly reacted as if startled. Lynn stepped out to show that he was only a human and not a competing bear. The bear, 20 feet away, immediately relaxed. It was an area where grizzlies are accustomed to seeing people, although not in that particular spot. The big grizzly calmly crossed the stream to proceed up the other bank. Not a problem.
Lily and yearlingsWe commend Disney for making a movie that shows bears how they are. It was made in the same location as Lynn’s encounter with the grizzly. We commend Jane Goodall for her comments. We continue to educate because of the attention any attack, like the attack in Florida, gets on national TV. Excessive media coverage of any bear attack mischaracterizes black bears and gets many bears killed. Our purpose is to show people how bears live and let people see for themselves whether bears are as ferocious as they are frequently portrayed. If black bears were like they are frequently portrayed, Lily Fans could not have witnessed what they have witnessed these past 5 years.
Thank you for all you do.
—Lynn Rogers and Sue Mansfield, Biologists, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center