Grizzly Bears in Yellowstone, LIVE! | Yellowstone Live

Hi everyone and welcome to West Yellowstone Montana! We are live at the Grizzly & Wolf Discovery Center sponsored by Microsoft Surface. My name is Kelly Barret, and I'm here with Sarah, a naturalist here at the center. Sarah is going to be sharing all about the grizzly bears here today.

So just to start off, can you tell us a little bit about the bears that we'll be looking at today and how they ended up here at the center?

"Yeah, I'd love to! Although the first thing I always encourage people to do is to watch those bears. You don't need to watch us because the bears are much more exciting. So, there are three bears out on the habitat right now; they are Roosevelt, Grant, and Quorum. We have seven grizzly bears that live here at the center altogether. All of the bears that live here had to come out of the wild due to some kind of conflict with humans, and none of them can ever go back out into the wild again.

So these bears right now are out here with all kinds of different enrichment. We move the bears in and out all day from their den area, which is indoors, and bring them out into this habitat in different groups, either one, two, or three at a time. That's just based on their size and their temperaments. Grizzly bears, by nature, are solitary animals, so it's not normal for them to be social. But here at the center, all of the bears are spayed and neutered, and of course, they're well-fed. So we've taken away most of the reasons they would have to really fight if they were out there in the wild, which would mostly be fighting over mating or protecting cubs or food sources. If we can socialize the bears here, we do.

Again, these bears are Grant and Roosevelt, left to right. The one on the far right with that cooler is Quorum. Grant and Roosevelt are here at the center; again, they are brothers, they're seven years old, and they're from Yellowstone National Park. When they were first-year bear cubs living in Yellowstone, they were orphaned after Park Service euthanized their mother due to public safety concerns. As orphaned bear cubs, they could not stay in the wild without their mother for protection. Grizzly bear cubs spend two to three years with their mothers, basically learning all the survival skills it takes out there. They're not a purely instinctive animal; they have to be taught lots of things, like where to find the berries, when they're ripe, where the fish are, how to build dens, and things like that.

So Grant and Roosevelt were too young to stay in the wild, and they were removed from the wild by Yellowstone Park Services. They arrived here at the center when they were about eight months old, and that was in late September 2011. Again, they're now seven years old. Grant over there on the left weighs about 475 pounds; his brother Roosevelt is closer to the 600-pound range, which is about an average range for a male grizzly bear in this area. So again, Quorum up there, he's from Coram, Montana, which is more into the Glacier National Park area. Quorum is what we call a food-conditioned bear.

As a wild bear, he had gained repeated access to human food sources. A food-conditioned bear is a bear that associates human-populated areas with food sources, so they look for food in neighborhoods, in towns, and campgrounds, and this creates a problem. So a food-conditioned bear doesn't look for food in the wild and is usually very comfortable around people; eventually, it will become bold and aggressive. Quorum was relocated many times by Montana Fish, Wildlife, and Parks, but again he kept going back to those easy food sources in campgrounds and neighborhoods. Eventually, he had to be removed from the wild. He arrived here early September 2011 at the age of three, and he weighs just over 600 pounds as well.

So these bears are looking for all the enrichment items that we have put out here in the habitat for them. Roosevelt already got a watermelon that we had put out in the pond, and Quorum has already broken into one of those coolers. So what we do here at the center is a container testing program. What happens is if there's a manufacturer that has some kind of container and wants to see if it's bear-resistant, then it will bring it to us for testing.

It might be a cooler, trash can, dumpster, or even a backpack or a stuff sack. The point is we want to keep bears from getting any kind of food reward from human sources. So what we do is we take the container, like that cooler that Grant is starting to work on, and we put some really yummy stuff inside there—maybe sardines, kibbles, maybe a bone or a fish. We want to make it something they really want, and so they'll work really hard to get into that container. If the bears here at the center work on the container for sixty minutes and don't get a food reward, then that container is considered to be bear-resistant. Again, we want to keep bears from getting any kind of food source from human areas.

We've actually won some major awards for contributing to the conservation of wild grizzly bears through our container testing program, which is in partnership with the U.S. Forest Service and the Interagency Grizzly Bear Committee, as well as the Montana Fish, Wildlife, and Parks. So we're really proud of our container testing program!

There was one question from the audience about Grant and Roosevelt's mother. Can you tell a little bit more about that story?

"Yeah! So Grant and Roosevelt were first-year bear cubs, and their mother was actually associated with two human fatalities in the summer of 2011. The first incident was a husband and wife who had been hiking together, and through a series of unfortunate events, several things happened that resulted in the mother grizzly bear, Grant, Roosevelt's mother, actually going after the people who didn't have bear spray and were also running.

Not to say anything negative about that, because it was an unfortunate event. However, it's really important if you're hiking in bear country to be aware of those bears. Quorum's going up that tree now. If you see a bear when you're hiking, you should turn around and go back to the safety of the trailhead. You should definitely carry bear spray. Again, if you do run into a bear in the wild, do not run because that means that bear is going to chase you. You don't want to be any kind of threat to that bear.

Because Park Service had all of the information from that first incident, which resulted in one death, they didn't take any action against the bear with her cubs, because they realized, again through a series of unfortunate events, that the mother bear was really just doing her job protecting her cubs. But there was a second incident, and in this case, there was a gentleman who was hiking alone. Again, we discourage people from hiking alone in bear country. Most bear encounters happen when there's only one or two people hiking or camping. Once you have three or four people, you make a lot of noise; the bears hear you're coming and generally will get out of your way.

So this gentleman was alone in the backcountry; there were a lot of bears in the area. He was ten miles into the backcountry and was encouraged to go out there with a group, but he chose to go alone. When they found him, he had already been dead for about 24 hours and nobody exactly knows what happened to him. There were several grizzly bears in the area, one of them happened to be Grant and Roosevelt's mother. Again, nobody exactly knows what her role was or if any; however, at this point, Park Service made the decision to remove her from the wild and thereby her cubs as well."

Some folks are kind of asking about the distinction between your center and maybe other typical zoos elsewhere. Can you talk about what makes this place special?

"One of the things that I think makes this place special is, again, we do lots of enrichment for these animals, especially the bears. We want to keep them not just physically healthy but also mentally healthy. It's one of the reasons why we move the bears in and out of the habitat all day long in different groupings. We can change that schedule every day, so they never really know what's happening every time they come out here.

We've put all kinds of interesting things out here; we bury lots of fruits and vegetables under those rocks and logs, we hang stuff in the trees, and we give them coolers to test, which is important for testing the coolers but also gives the bears some enrichment. There are some fish in the pond right now. I don't think they know that yet, but we do lots of things to give them enrichment. So that's one of the things we're really proud of here at the center is the way that we care for these animals."

Absolutely! So you talked a little bit about the bears here and what the typical day might look like for them.

"Yeah! So a typical day for these bears, again, we're going to move them in and out of this habitat area. Bears in the wild are not active all the time; they're mostly active in the morning and the evenings. They'll actually spend a lot of the day in what we call a daybed—that is napping. Yeah, he's, I don't know if he's trying really hard to get into it or just playing with that in the water. Regardless, it is fun to watch.

So, in the wild, again, they spend a lot of their days napping, resting. They want to conserve their energy; they don't want to expend a lot of energy. They are omnivores, and we call them opportunistic omnivores; they're always looking for the easiest food source with the least caloric expansion. So again, they rest a lot in the wild.

So here at the center, we mimic a lot of what they would do in the wild. So when they're out here, they are more active; they can forage for food very. They can, again, you know, sometimes we put out different scent things; they can roll it. They're a scent-oriented animal, so that's very exciting for them. Then when they're back in their dens, they have toys and food. We give them beds at night, and again they can rest back there, which mimics their wild behavior.

And I think it's great that you all do educational activities and demonstrate to show people who come back what to do in the event that they encounter a bear and how to have a proper campsite. We had the demonstration last night on Yellowstone Live about the campsite and how the bears kind of took that down. Do you want to speak to that a little bit about how?"

"Absolutely! Again, the best way we can keep wild bears out there in the wild is by prohibiting them from getting any food source from a human source ever. Bears are very smart and they are single-time learners. That means they can get into a cooler one time, and they'll never forget. They can get a bird feeder down one time, and they never forget.

So the reason we set up those mock campsites is to educate people about camping in bear country. Again, if a bear gets into a campground and gets the food reward that these bears got last night—which they got a pretty good food reward—then that bear is very likely to continue going into campgrounds to look for food. Of course, that's going to create a dangerous situation for the people there and ultimately for that bear.

So when we set up those campsites, it's again to educate people to be bear aware, whether they're camping, hiking, or any kind of recreation in bear country. And again, that goes for black bears as well as grizzly bears."

Yeah, absolutely. And can you talk about the birds that are also here?

"Yeah! These are ravens. Ravens are scavengers, and so they're doing the same thing here at the center that they would be in the wild, which is hanging around large predators like bears and wolves. Ravens are really smart, but they cannot, you know, kill a fish or take down an elk or something to that effect. So, they will symbiotically live with both grizzly bears and gray wolves in order to survive. They know that they can get food sources again from maybe a leftover carcass in the wild, and here at the center, again, the bears don't pick up all the food we put out there for them, so the ravens do become the cleanup crew, I call them."

Great! Some folks are asking if they are visiting Yellowstone National Park if they can come by and their admission fee. Do they need to get some?

"Absolutely! We would love to have you come by! We're again in West Yellowstone, which is the west entrance of Yellowstone National Park. We do have an admission. In the summer months, we're open 8:30 to 8:30. Our hours do change seasonally. The admission is good for two consecutive days, so when you do come to the center, you can plan for that.

It also allows you to come and go as much as you like, so you can look at our schedule, which again changes every day, and come participate in different experiences with the bears, the wolves, the ground squirrels, and of course the raptors, and all the different educational programming we have throughout the day."

Absolutely! So if you're watching and following along, feel free to chime in with any comments or questions; we'll try to get to them. Can you talk a little bit about how these three are together? Because I know earlier one of the bears was just solo in the habitat, and now there's three together, so they get along well these days?

"Yeah! Of course, Roosevelt is backed by those trees. He's lighter in color than his brother Grant, who's in the pond. I think Roosevelt's going in the pond right now, and they are siblings. Now, in the wild, they would have split up probably when they were two or three years old because, again, bears are solitary. But here at the center, they don't need to go off on their own, and they are allowed to sort of stay in that sort of cub-like behavior throughout their lives.

Quorum goes out there with him, with Grant and Roosevelt. It's kind of an unusual relationship, if you will. Quorum just gets along very well with both Grant and Roosevelt, and the three of them can sort of interchange with each other. They sometimes all three play together, sometimes the brothers play together, and sometimes Quorum plays with one or the other. So it's kind of a neat relationship that these bears have."

Are any of the animals within your center—do they ever reproduce, or how does that work?

"So all of the bears and the wolves here at the center are spayed and neutered, so we don't do any breeding here at the center. You know, grizzly bears can live a very long life. An average wild lifespan for a grizzly bear is about 15 to 20 years. But in captivity, the median lifespan for a male grizzly bear like these three is twenty-one. For a female grizzly bear, the median lifespan in captivity is twenty-six.

Now we do have a bear here at the center named Bear 101, and she's 36 years old, so that's exceptional. So again, a bear can live a very long life, and we prefer to provide a place for a bear to live that needs a home—that, you know, again has to come out of the wild."

Absolutely! So just continuing to get some questions about some of the enrichment that you have within the habitat and, you know, why do we provide the coolers and some of the instruction that you provide?

"Yeah! So again, bears are very smart, and they are always looking for food. In the wild, since they're only up for a portion of the year because of hibernation, they are very focused on finding food pretty much all of their waking hours. So again, here at the center, we kind of mimic what they would be doing in the wild—the foraging, the food sources. We want to keep them moving around and getting that good exercise.

Not just exercising their bodies but really exercising their brains. Sometimes we put out different scent enrichment. Again, both bears and wolves are very scent-oriented animals, so when they smell something new and different, it's kind of like when we read a book or watch a movie and we get all this great information. The other day, it was really windy; Behr was out just sitting with her nose in the air for about 20 minutes, probably getting all kinds of information. Bears can smell up to 18 miles away, so you can imagine all the information that they're getting from all the different sources out there.

So we might do scent enrichment, like food enrichment. Again, we put things out there in the pond; we get trout donated from Anna's Fish Hatchery. Right now, there are some live trout, although the bears haven't caught them yet. I think Grant is there, sweet water, call it submarining, looking for fish, so he might catch one. Again, the container testing is actually for the manufacturers; however, that container testing is also more enrichment for the bears. So lots of different things. Again, we hang mock bird feeders up in the trees to teach people to please don't hang bird feeders if you live in bear country and also to show that grizzly bears can indeed climb trees. And then, of course, burying the food makes them use their noses, which means they use their brains, so they have to find it and forage just like they would in the wild."

Right! Well, this has been wonderful! Thank you so much for sharing your information and providing this habitat where the grizzly bears can thrive. As we close up, just another mention for our sponsorship with Microsoft Surface, so a big shout out to them! Make sure to tune in for Yellowstone live tonight!

"Yeah, thanks so much, everyone!"