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Holly and Lucky Having Fun, Field Courses - UPDATE April 10, 2016
10 April 2016
Holly and Lucky look like the contented couple. They love having fun with each other. It?s enough to just stay home Grizzly mom and cub touching noses
Grizzly mom and cub touch noses
and be together?no need to travel. Their pen is open. They could explore the big enclosure to stimulate their minds with new surroundings. If they are hungry, they could see if nature has provided any of the new foods that are available by mid-April in some years. Instead of getting out and working, they just stay home and play together as a Lily Fan captured for us in this 5-minute video at
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3QWU_kLi0ww&feature=youtu.be&t=228.
Ted and Honey aren?t any better. When staff walked up and called to them as if it were feeding time. Neither of them bothered to get up and see what was afoot.
I?m looking forward to the last half of this week to see if their internal clocks or the warm weather that is coming will stir a desire to travel. In the wild, roaming for most bears begins with green-up in early May.
While they are still staying home in their small pens, I wish we could see what is happening in their dens?especially the interactions between Holly and Lucky. Holly has showed us the difficulties in keeping a Den Cam working around her. The staff is planning how to watch her next winter and not be thwarted by her curiosity about the camera.
I?d also like to add another bear to the mix within a year if we can find the right young bear?preferably a spring cub or a socialized yearling the staff can work with.
Today was a day of getting things together for the Bear Center opening. One thing was pictures for the upper walls of the Bear Center. One that I like is this picture of a mother grizzly and her cub.
Also looking forward to the Black Bear Field Courses that start July 17 and still have spaces open. The emphasis of these courses is learning directly from the bears. The focus is on participants having close-up experiences with bears to learn bear personalities and have experiences that give a greater depth of learning than is possible in any other way. Close-up experiences are what create a heart for bears. It?s why the main words we hear from past participants is that it was a ?Life-changing experience.? What got me thinking about this was a wonderful letter from a 2010 participant from England who is in International Relations. She said the bears demonstrate the fundamental truth which lies at the core of international relations: ?it isn?t about whether they like us or not, it?s about whether they?re happy with the deal.? She wrote, ?If only we were as rational as the bears, how much more peacefully our international conflicts could be managed!? She ended her letter with, ?Me, and the bears, and the wolves, and the woods, we were all happy with the deal.?
I?m looking forward to July.
Thank you for all you do.
Lynn Rogers, Biologist, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center
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Topic: Jewel and her cubs (Read 2358522 times)