Scared and relieved
April 19, 2010 – 7:52 PM CDT
Lily’s GPS readings came from the same place all day. Had she slipped her collar again? Would the Lily and Hope story abruptly end? We checked on them at 6 PM and found all was well. Accompanied by Beth Jett and Carrie Connmeier of Fox 21 News, Lynn found Lily and Hope at the bed they had used a couple days ago. Lily calmly traded a heart rate (only 68, counted twice) for a handful of nuts. Hope was nowhere in sight. Lynn checked the bed and found Hope fast asleep. She awoke and retreated to the back of the bed. Lily approached and asked Lynn to move so she could check on the little one. All was well. They left, relieved, and will post a link to the news story when it airs in a day or two. They also visited Lily’s empty den. That will be in the story, too.
2-year-old Jo headed back to out into her territory after her brief visit to civilization. Today she spent time in the same clear-cut where June and Lily fed on bull thistle roots 2 years ago. Perhaps Jo was doing the same.
Braveheart lost her collar over the weekend and Sue retrieved it today. As is typical, it was next to a marking tree. When bears rub the back of their neck and head up and down on a tree, the bark often gives enough friction to slide the collar off.
June had us worried. She uncharacteristically stayed in the same place most of the day after several days of steady movement. At 6:50 PM, she and her yearlings Jewel and Jordan resumed their travels just as we were making plans for picking up her collar. They have been so far from any road that retrieving a dropped radio-collar would have taken a full day! The wonders of GPS are adding data that would have been impossible a few years back.
Earlier today we posted an April 16 video of Juliet and her 3 cubs—and just now posted April 18 footage of Hope taken by Gordon Buchanan.
Thank you again for your continued much appreciated support.
—Lynn Rogers and Sue Mansfield, Biologists, North American Bear Center