Another encounter with June
July 25, 2010 – 9:22 PM CDT
Lily and Hope had a brush with June today, but unlike last time, Lily and Hope stuck together. June stayed in the area of the encounter
, while Lily and Hope moved 1.7 miles away. All of this was in an area rich with pincherries and raspberries that Hope had never visited before. June had been foraging there for 3 hours when Lily and Hope arrived. We noticed a sudden change in both June’s and Lily’s GPS locations and surmise that June protected her foraging rights by chasing Lily off. June remained in the area for another hour before moving on. Many of the pincherry trees in the area were freshly broken down (picture)—likely from June pulling them down to feed on the berries.
We checked on Jo again to replace the piece of breakaway leather that was ready to break and drop the collar. In changing it, we found what had scratched the vehicle Jo ran into on the highway. The driver reported a scratch on the vehicle. One of the protruding screws on her collar was badly bent. To bend it like that would have required quite a blow. She was a lucky bear.
Juliet’s GPS unit quit, so we visited her and her 3 cubs to replace it. The work with Jo and Juliet was easy thanks to the wonderful filberts (hazelnuts) and pecan halves Lily’s fans have been sending. Thank you again. They make a big difference. Also, a thank you to the 10-year-old boy who wrote a book about a bear and sent the sales proceeds to help Lily and Hope. The proceeds will be used to buy more nuts for working with the radio-collared bears including Lily and Hope.
And, a thank you to all the teachers who are joining the classroom outreach project Corelyn Senn is coordinating. Emails on the project are going to
Some have suggested raising money by allowing individuals and classroom to ‘adopt’ research bears. That could be a good fundraiser for the research, but we have resisted the idea because these are wild bears that face many dangers. There’s always the possibility an adopted bear could be killed on the highway or during hunting season. We’re working with hunters to spare radio-collared bears, and cooperation is growing. These bears not only educate the world about bears, they have economic value for the region. Most hunters feel that it’s just plain wrong to shoot a bear that provides scientific knowledge, educates the public, and brings economic benefits to the region they way these bears do. We hope all hunters will come to feel that way. The six-week hunting season starts September 1 and is the most stressful time of year for us. Thoughts of what one hunter’s bullet could do to the research keep us awake at night. We are helpless against that. We can only hope for the good will of hunters in sparing the radio-collared bears.
Thank you for all you do and for your contributions.
—Lynn Rogers and Sue Mansfield, Biologists, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center