We just got unpacked, (mostly), when our friends George and
Val came over to say hello. They then invited us to spend the next day
searching for bears In Grand Teton National Park. Even though rocks were calling
me, (we work rock into cabochons and jewelry), we quickly agreed!
The next morning, we got an early start, about eight thirty,
and headed for the park. Its only about fifty miles away. Of course, we had to
stop in Jackson at the Bunnery where we purchased the best sticky buns we have
ever tasted.
Armed for a close encounter with bears we ate the buns on
the way into the park. As we passed a buffalo herd I spotted an animal and
George pulled over. It was a huge grizzly boar! We watched, from a safe
distance as it grazed on grass, unconcerned about the minor traffic jam.
As more cars stopped, we pointed out the bear and one man
told us of a bear up near Togetee Pass. He said the bear was just ten minutes
above the Blackrock Ranger station and was grazing in the ditch. Deciding to go
looking for bear number two we headed up the pass.
Seeing a car stopped we slowed down and there it was! Our
second grizzly of the day! It was completely unconcerned with the four cars and
slowly grazed toward us. You usually think of grizzlies as carnivores but they
are omnivores, and often feed on the new spring grass.
It neared us as it grazed and ended up about twenty feet
away! Of course, we were inside the truck and we were all holding our breath at
the incredible close contact! Now we have been close to a brown bear in Alaska
but this is the closest we have ever been in the lower forty-eight
Even though the bear wore a collar and an ear tag, it
obviously had never tasted human food and so it ignored the vehicles. If you are ever close to a bear, remember
that a fed bear is a dead bear! Once used to human food it will eventually
cause so many problems it will become dangerous and it will be killed.
The bear finally started to graze back to where it stared
and so we turned around and headed back into the park. The State of Wyoming has
announced that it will hold a grizzly bear season and my question to the hunter
that will kill this bear is. Will you mount the bear with its collar and ear tag,
(The bear was outside the park)?
I do hope that next fall’s hunters will only be allowed to
harvest problem bears. They are killed when they develop a taste for fresh cows
and sheep and endanger people. Having lived in Wyoming for forty years, I do
understand the problem faced by the expanding bear population. According to the
latest count a population of seven hundred to a thousand now exist in the
Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem and its surrounding area
Time to get off the pulpit. Heading back into the park we
next turned north at Moran Junction in hopes of scoring a trifecta, three bears
in one day! We first drove to Pilgrim c\Creek but that’s for the second part of
this blog! To be continued oh and Clear skies
One word WOW!!!
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