Guest Photos

This grizzly bear is not being selective eating this pink salmon. Looks like the “whole” fish is to be devoured not just the eggs or the other high fat body parts.  The closer it is to the end of the salmon run and therefore hibernation the more likely it is that all the salmon is eaten. It comes down to numbers; the number of days left to put on sufficient number of pounds to survive the winter. Fat brown bears are more selective and this bear’s belly is a little to far from the water meaning that it does need to add some bulk.

This photo by Lynn Morris shows two grizzly bears, each eating salmon, and not being concerned with the closeness of the other bear.  The abundance of pink salmon means that there are few disputes over fishing rights and those are settled without bloodshed. It is estimated that there are close to fifty grizzly bears in the Glendale River valley during the peak of the pink salmon run in September. The number of salmon means that all are able to obtain enough food without risking injury by fighting. A dispute normally means that one bear will just move up of down river to another fishing area and still be able to catch enough salmon to satisfy it’s hunger.

This is the case of a lazy fishing grizzly.  This bear is in a reasonably deep hole compared to the water just 30 meters (90 feet) up stream.  The grizzlies up stream often wound salmon which die and drift down to this lower pool where this bear waits to scoop up the salmon without wasting any energy chasing the salmon.  From the first picture is yesterdays post you can see the fish is not moving and it is just a matter of getting the salmon in the right position to eat or it could be considered playing with ones food. Either way the final photo seems to depict a satisfied grizzly.

Grizzly Bear Lodge is one of two lodges that have access to viewing stands on Knight Inlet’s Glendale River.  Access is granted after August 24th each year. After a boat run up Knight Inlet in the morning you transfer to shore and a fifteen-minute van ride to the viewing stands on Glendale River’s man-made spawning channel.  Our access time is from ten to noon each day.  There are two stands available of which we prefer the second as it is on both the natural river and the spawning channel entrance.  Directly below the stand is a deeper area, which holds the pink salmon before they go over the weir in to the spawning area.  This is the site of the above photos.

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