Cautious Hope - 040292010It full time work on exhibits around here, with the help of many Lily Fans. Among other things, we’re putting together pictures for a new exhibit on Lily and her family. It will go over the drinking fountains where visitors will see it the moment they walk in the Bear Center. Some of the pictures are of lesser quality and have never been shown, but they say a lot—especially to people who have followed Lily’s story.
Lily with Mother June - 02-27-2007One is of Lily being snuggled by her mother June in their den when Lily’s eyes had not fully opened yet. She looks content in the crook of June’s arm with the side of June’s head against her on February 27, 2007, when Lily was about 6 weeks old.
Another was about a month later when an early thaw had flooded June, Lily, Cal, and Bud out of their den. When I visited them on March 25, 2007, June was cradling little Lily and licking her dry. They were just outside the wet den. In the background, snow still remains on a north slope that would be snow-free in just 4 days. With snow gone, the den dried out, and the family moved back in. They stayed until April 16, as you know from seeing their exodus in the video clip a few days ago.
June drying off Lily - 03-25-2007A third picture is the look 3-month-old Hope gave an unfamiliar person who accompanied Sue and me on a visit to Lily and Hope. Hope was past the developmental stage when she would readily accept strangers. She took one look at the man and scooted up a tree. When she took a quick peek at him, her head was a blur, but somehow her eye was sharp in the picture the man took. To me, the eye speaks of caution and distrust. It says something about habituation to a couple humans not being a loss of fear of all humans.
A fourth picture is of One-eyed Jack at one of the community feeding stations. Jack is known for his gentle, tolerant nature that apparently extends beyond the people he knows at the feeding station. Apparently it extends to chipmunks, at least this one that seemed to know him, and vice versa. The chipmunk had no problem joining Jack at the dinner table and filling its cheeks with the same food Jack was eating so close that Jack was nearly touching the chipmunk with his paw and mouth as the picture shows. The chipmunk trusted Jack, and Jack was tolerant.
One-Eyed Jack - 06-28-2012Both chipmunks and bears are animals that quite readily learn to trust. That means both have the intelligence and willingness to assess risks and benefits associated with obtaining food. When the food is at feeding stations, as has been the case in this community for decades, it does not make them more dangerous. It makes them less dangerous as the decades of safe feeding in this community has shown and as we have found in our decades of safe, close-up bear studies.
Knowing the value of these bears to science, their lack of danger to the public, and how they were demonstrating the nature of black bears in a way that was changing the attitudes of open-minded people, I very much wanted radio-collared bears protected. Lily Fans saw that and did everything possible to help, even as you are trying to help stop the DNR’s latest action. Thank you.
Thank you for all you do.
Lynn Rogers, Biologist, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center