Daily Updates
Ted, Holly, Sophie, Ellie, Spanky, Heat - UPDATE May 22, 2016
22 May 2016
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Ted knew how to deal with this 81? day?squirm around in the creek, put water on his head as we?ve seen wild bears do, lounge awhile, and then exit wet, Spanky
Spanky, Shadow's male yearling

looking lean but not mean.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVc_lega_V4.
Holly was digging at her old den from a couple years ago, which reminds us of June digging an early den on July 19, 2004 when she was also three. June went ahead and had cubs in hers that winter.
Holly at her dug den
Holly at her dug den

The team narrowed the identity of the ?Sophie? we wrongly identified on the 18th to one bear?Ellie. People have been asking about Ellie. Now we know. Ellie is three and beautiful and will likely have cubs next year. She has such a sweet personality, I look forward to introducing Black Bear Field Course participants to her this summer. As a cub, she was always more calm and confident than her brother Eli who would be high in a tree when Ellie had decided it was safe to descend and be with her mother Lily in 2013.
Eli, who visits the WRI is friendly once he knows it is safe. His main concern seems to be other bears and people who he doesn?t know. When he is not certain, he has a habit of taking a big mouthful of food to the base of a big white pine to eat in total safety while looking around a lot.
Holly digging at her den
Holly digging at her den

Ellie, by contrast, has the serene look she gave me for the picture in the update of May 18 that I?d like to blow up for an upper wall in the Bear Center. When I took that picture, she was eating nuts at a feeding station and didn?t even bother to look up when the owner came out the door and walked quickly to her and dumped more. She?d been through that routine many times.
This is a community that loves wildlife. I heard a story today of a Lily Fan who visited and ended up petting a wild flying squirrel to feel the ultra-soft fur.
Today I got a jolt when I got a call about an orphaned cub in the neighborhood. Word somehow spread. When I got there, a resident was leaving, having identified the bear as yearling Spanky, newly separated from his mother Shadow. Spanky is easily identified by the light fur that loops over each eye like spectacles. The white seeds on his nose are sunflower seed hearts. The people who called love bears.
I?m glad to be part of this community that loves nature.
Thank you for all you do.
Lynn Rogers, Biologist, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center