20060522 Bear Training

Two days of bear training began today. I've been through bear training talks a number of times before, but the others have been focused on black bears in Sequoia/Kings. Katmai NP has no black bears, only brown bears. BIG brown bears. Males in fall can weigh 900 pounds or more. Brown bears and grizzly bears are the same species. By convention, coastal Urus arctos are called brown bears, while those of the interior are the grizzlies.

Brown bear behavior toward other brown bears runs the gamut from tender to cruel. The image shows a young bear at play. Isn't it cute? But when it grows up, it can be less than cute as an horrific video made right here demonstrated. A dominant male brown bear standing in shallow Brooks River attacks a smaller but still quite large male bear. Eventually the attacker kills the victim and feeds upon him.

From tender to cruel...reminds me of another species.