Grizzly Bear and Wildlife Tour Blog

From late May to August 24^th grizzly bear watching from our lodge takes place on the shores of Knight Inlet and in the estuary of the Glendale River. Grizzlies alternate between eating berries, digging roots, grazing on sedge grass and rolling rock in search of protein. This low tide offers a good beach for this sub-adult grizzly to spend hours on the beach to obtain enough food to keep it alive until the salmon arrive in mid-August.

Twelve minutes later on the same day a mother grizzly with three cubs came out of the bush where the cubs are standing. She was checking the area behind the rocks for salmon before moving into the holding pool and closer to the viewing stands.

The viewing platform used by Grizzly Bear Lodge on the Glendale River has the natural river on one side and end and the holding pool to the salmon spawning channel on the other side. This photo shows the river in the background and the entrance to the holding pool. This is also the easiest access for the grizzlies as they walk up river. In this case the juvenile grizzly on the log had just moved quickly from the gravel bar to the log and then into the bush. A few minutes later after the larger adult male had moved into the pool it came back out to see if it was safe to come and fish. It was and it did.

As in yesterdays post this mother grizzly had been turning over rocks. This inter-tidal zone “food” is high in protein and is made up of crab, clams, barnacles, amphipods and other tiny invertebrates. The “beach food” is important because plant food is relatively scarce during spring and bears will continue to loose weight until well into June. This photo from July 23 shows her triplets taking a break while mother continues to graze on the protein rich sedge grass.

This photo was taken from the viewing stands on September 2 (we are permitted to use these platforms after August 24^th). This mother grizzly had been fishing in the pool next to the stands for about forty-five minutes while the cubs roamed the gravel bar. (Note that the cubs to not like to get wet unless force by their mother to cross the river.) The four cubs finally tired of their play and curled up for a nap while heir mother come closer to stand guard.

.. and I remember this morning because as the bears turned and came toward our boat I knew that if I did not move into deeper water and give them room they would have turned into the estuary. If that happened we would not have had the good viewing and photo opportunities which occurred. The distance to the grizzly mother and cubs less than thirty meters (yards).