Bear Center work crewWhile Jewel and her cubs have remained within a half-mile of their den so far, Juliet and her cubs have made a significant move, traveling a mile and a half and crossing a river to settle in a new location. We wish we could have seen the crossing. Long ago, a man told us of watching cubs climb on their mother’s back to cross a river. We’ve been hoping to video a ‘cub-crossing’ but haven’t caught one yet.
Cleaning out Lucky's denAster and Lily also made significant moves in the last 24 hours. Aster moved 2 ½ miles, and Lily moved 4 miles from where we joined her and her yearlings yesterday. Could this be family breakup? Knowing she was in advanced estrus (very swollen) yesterday and still with Eli and Ellie, we doubly want to intercept her now to see who she is with. A problem is that she is in an inaccessible area, but if she has hormones urging her to move and lay down scent trails, she could soon be accessible again. Field research with wide-ranging bears is difficult, of course, but with GPS and acceptance by some of the study bears, we can learn things that would be impossible otherwise.
JulietLorie Kennedy connected with Juliet and changed her GPS batteries today. She also determined that Faith is still inaccessible in an area she used last year. Faith is a bear that grew up with a lot of human contact and a lot of time at community feeding stations. She moved to a place where she is unlikely to see any humans. Last year, she didn’t visit a single community feeding site and never went near a human residence. Now 3 years old, she should come into estrus and travel more widely to lay down scent trails if a male doesn’t find her where she is. If she travels, we hope to intercept her and give her a GPS unit to learn the “rest of the story” of her life.
Staining picnic tablesYesterday at the Bear Center, Heidi stroked Holly’s head as she gave Holly her bottle. What made it doubly special was that Heidi’s two young children were watching with Judy Thon behind the camera, learning what their mom does at work. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sW_0MkwkUcE.
Over the last two days, a troop of Lily Fans made great strides at the Bear Center. They dug a shallow ditch a couple hundred feet long to bury cable for Bear Cams for the new pens. They put a new top on the shelter for this summer’s Camp Bear Paw. They stained the 3 picnic tables in that shelter, and they cleaned the old straw out of Lucky’s den. Thank you seems inadequate.
Thank you for all you do.
—Lynn Rogers and Sue Mansfield, Biologists, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center
All photos were taken today unless otherwise noted.