This weekend Jeremy and I headed to the Book Cliff area of South Eastern Utah where we set up camp and spent the night in the sagebrush desert and then got up the next morning to join a group of biologists led by Dr.Black to get some experience "bear-
denning." Here is a picture of our lovely camp-site, because we got there late at night we didn't even know what it looked like until the morning when Jeremy took this picture!
The next day's activity consisted of meeting at the start of a rough dirt-road and then piling in to the back of any pick-ups around and heading up to the mountains to find a bear! The bear we were looking for, 'Xena', is part of an 18 year study that consisted of trapping female black bears in the summers, affixing them with radio-telemetry collars, and then tracking them to their dens in the spring to monitor how many cubs they had each year and how healthy they were. Over the years Xena has had about 18 cubs but was not very successful at raising them until recent years when she has had 2 sets of triplets! So, we were excited to see what we would find!
Once we were close we pulled off the road to hike to the den. It was actually a short hike and we were there in a few minutes but the waiting was not over! We had to wait for a long time for the biologists to tranquilize the bear and then pull her to the mouth of her den where they could examine her and her one cub. After the measurements were taken, we were allowed to go down and see the cub and the mother bear briefly and take some of these pictures.
Xena was sleeping pretty soundly but we had to be quiet not to startle her out of her drug-induced snooze! I like this picture because you can see that the den goes back behind us for some distance, the bears were way in the back and had piles of shredded bark as their bedding. The mother bear was about 218 pounds and her 2 month old cub was less than 10 pounds and still had its eyes shut! It is hard to believe that when the cub was born it was probably only about 2 pounds!
I was impressed by how soft the bears were; I expected the cub to be soft, but the sow was very soft as well! The cub was a lot like an over-sized puppy but with very sharp little claws! We were mostly observers but it was a unique experience because we got to see and touch a live bear and her cub! Plus, it is always nice to get out of town occasionally to have some adventures!
The next day's activity consisted of meeting at the start of a rough dirt-road and then piling in to the back of any pick-ups around and heading up to the mountains to find a bear! The bear we were looking for, 'Xena', is part of an 18 year study that consisted of trapping female black bears in the summers, affixing them with radio-telemetry collars, and then tracking them to their dens in the spring to monitor how many cubs they had each year and how healthy they were. Over the years Xena has had about 18 cubs but was not very successful at raising them until recent years when she has had 2 sets of triplets! So, we were excited to see what we would find!
Once we were close we pulled off the road to hike to the den. It was actually a short hike and we were there in a few minutes but the waiting was not over! We had to wait for a long time for the biologists to tranquilize the bear and then pull her to the mouth of her den where they could examine her and her one cub. After the measurements were taken, we were allowed to go down and see the cub and the mother bear briefly and take some of these pictures.
Xena was sleeping pretty soundly but we had to be quiet not to startle her out of her drug-induced snooze! I like this picture because you can see that the den goes back behind us for some distance, the bears were way in the back and had piles of shredded bark as their bedding. The mother bear was about 218 pounds and her 2 month old cub was less than 10 pounds and still had its eyes shut! It is hard to believe that when the cub was born it was probably only about 2 pounds!
I was impressed by how soft the bears were; I expected the cub to be soft, but the sow was very soft as well! The cub was a lot like an over-sized puppy but with very sharp little claws! We were mostly observers but it was a unique experience because we got to see and touch a live bear and her cub! Plus, it is always nice to get out of town occasionally to have some adventures!
3 comments:
How cool! I hope you are doing well. email me and I'll invite you to our blog. magulden@gmail.com
SWEET!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
that is way cool, thank you for telling me you updated your blog- I really like hearing about your adventures- what more can I say, I love you and thanks for sharing the fun!
wish i was there
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