Grizzly bear claws can be used to hold a salmon to share with a cub as shown in the March 29th posting or they can be used to dissect a salmon as shown in toady’s. Janis Worsley from the UK used a long lens to capture this grizzly at work.
Great Britain’s Lindy Taylor provides another great photo, this one of a mother grizzly bear sharing a salmon with her first year cub. This photo shows the claws holding the salmon so the cub can feed. The normal claw length is seven to ten centimeters (3 to 4 inches) long and useful to catch and hold the salmon. Again the salmon is being eaten headfirst, as the mother and cub need to fatten to survive hibernation….more cub tomorrow.
Same bear from yesterday’s post eating the salmon headfirst. This photo was taken on September 1 which is one week into Grizzly Bear Lodge’s use of the viewing platform on Knight Inlet’s Glendale River. The salmon arrive in the river mouth in mid-August and start up the river in late August giving the bear their first opportunity to catch salmon. This means that the grizzlies are hungry and will normally eat the whole fish and not be selective and eat only the protein rich roe and belly fat.
This photo form one stand toward the other shows an interesting occurrence. The mother grizzly with two two-year old cubs had passed our viewing platform and walked down the road toward the other stand only to come face to face with another bear walking out of the spawning channel area to the natural river on the other side of the road. What happened? Nothing, the bears passed and went on their way. The abundance of food in the area means that there is little aggression between grizzlies as long each respects the other’s comfort zone. A large male may dominate the viewing area for a while but it just means that the other bears wait until it leaves before coming to feed.
From August 25th to early October the grizzly bear tour from Grizzly Bear Lodge goes to the Glendale River on Knight Inlet on uses one of two viewing platforms located near a man made salmon spawning channel. The two stands are less than seventy-five meters (yards) apart and each provide excellent opportunities for close up bear viewing. The above photo provided by UK’s Lynn Morris shows a grizzly bear walking beneath the viewing stand. It does show how close the bears come to the stand but not the “grandeur” of the bear….. view of other stand tomorrow
This photo provided by Lynn Morris is one most guest want to capture. The grizzly with a salmon in it’s mouth the other being a video of a grizzly bear catching the salmon. If you enlarge the photo you will notice many salmon in the water in front of the bear and yesterday’s post shows the abundance of salmon in this section of the river.
A great photo by Lynn Morris showing the numbers of salmon in Knight Inlet’s Glendale River. From late August to early October it is these salmon that bring the grizzly bears to our viewing area. This area is about an hour and fifteen minutes by boat from the lodge on Minstrel Island. At this time of the year the grizzly bear tours use a viewing platform which overlooks the entrance to a manmade spawning channel and for the bears this is like “fishing in a barrel”. The spring and early summer viewing occurs along the shore and in the estuary of the Glendale Cove which attracts the bears because of the abundance of high protein sedge grass, the tidal flats and rocky shore with their animal protein.
After some time in the water the mother grizzly and cub moved up the beach toward the river mouth. One can see that the tide has started to rise and the beach is disappearing and this means that the bears will move up toward the shallower estuary and river mouth. Fortunately once we arrive by boat from the lodge we switch to a large flat bottom skiff which permits us to follow the bears as they move into this shallow area. This enables good close up pictures from a stable boat, which allows guests to move about without fear of tipping or rocking. Yesterdays posted photo and today’s are just two of the many provide by Marc & Solange
Mid-August can be quite warm in Knight Inlet’s Glendale Cove where we watch the grizzly bears as they come to the beach in search of food either protein from turning over rocks or the sedge grass that grows in the river estuary. The Cove is a one and a quarter hour boat ride from the lodge along the shore of Knight Inlet. The Glendale River mouth attracts grizzly bears that spend spring and summer feeding in the area and many are mothers with cubs. If you wore a fur coat in the summer you might want to spend some time in the water on a play date with mom. Marc & Solange visiting from France provided this photograph.
A most unique and interesting set of photos provided by Martyn and Viv Stucke who say “We took (the photos) while out with Glen last year on the 30 May. As you will see they are of mother feeding her three cubs, we gather from Glen quite a rare sight. We watched mother feeding on the rocks with her cubs playing around her for about an hour, she then took them up on the beach only about 50-80 m from us and fed them. The attached are a few photos of the cubs feeding.” The late May and June tours are the time when the cubs first come to the beach with their mothers and are of course the smallest as they would be only three to four months old.
Just like that another season has come to an end. We are grateful for all the wonderful staff and the guests this season. It was an excellent season and we are already looking forward to next May.
One of the highlights of the season was all of the new cubs out. It was awesome to see so many new cubs of the year and that is great news for our bear populations moving forward. We had great spring viewing and this continued through summer. On our river trips we started to see salmon arriving in August and enjoyed some great shoulder season viewing. The fish at the viewing platforms were a little late showing up this year, but viewing during late September at the platforms was great and the estuary viewing remained strong throughout the season.
Out in the whale watching world it was another year that saw large numbers of resident Orca who remained in the area right into October. The Humpback viewing was also great with large numbers feeding in Blackfish Sound. It is so amazing to have these magnificent animals back in our waters in such numbers.
Over the winter and spring we will be doing some repairs and maintenance. We rebuilt the front deck last spring, utilising cedar cut on site. We will continue with some siding, rooms improvements and hopefully a floating sauna ready for the start of our season.
2026 is already looking like a very busy season for us. We only have limited high season availability so please book early to ensure we have space for your group.
Looking forward to seeing you next year
Angus Reid
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