Where's the best port to pet a grizzly bear?

[potatopotato]

OP you truly made my day! I guess if you go in the winter and one is hibernating then you can pet it?

 

In all seriousness, the only time I've ever seen a "petable" grizzly was from an animal trainer who had it since birth and trained it for the movies. The ones in the sanctuaries and rehabs are all still considered to be wild animals.

[gottagoacruzn]

Oh, forgot to mention, you can take the bear out of the wild, but you can't take the wild out of the bear

[emd138]

On 1/31/2023 at 3:43 PM, njsmom said:

Makes sense. Some friends and I were camping in tents in King's Canyon in Sequoia National Park in California several years ago and after dinner, while taking the trash to the bear-proof trash dumpster, a black bear walked up to take the bag away. Just dropped it and backed up slowly to go back to the campsite. So disturbing! The bear licked all of the dinner wrappers and waddled off to another campsite. We heard people banging on pots and pans all night long to run him off. 

There are some insanely "tame" bears there.  We had one walking through some pretty good crowds when we were there.

[Sigyn]

1 hour ago, emd138 said:

There are some insanely "tame" bears there.  We had one walking through some pretty good crowds when we were there.

It's frightening how used they are to stealing food from campsites in King's Canyon. The next night, I heard some people move into the campsite next to ours around midnight. I couldn't figure out why they were arriving so late. They were rustling around the site a lot, and I even heard them walking around my tent. We woke up the next morning, and the campsite next to ours was empty! Our friends were in a tent down the hill from us, and they said that they saw a bear walking around our tent late in the night when they got up to go to the bathroom. So that wasn't a neighboring camper moving in, it was a bear, sniffing around for food. We were smart, luckily, and had all food-scented items in the bear lockers, even the clothes that we'd cooked in, after the encounter the night before. 

 

The park ranger visited us the next day, and said the bear had stolen a cooler full of steaks from one campsite and warned us to keep our food locked up. We assured him that we were. 

 

So, yes, my "pet a grizzly bear" post was a joke, pure and simple. I saw 17 grizzlies the day I went to Denali and I had no desire to walk up to any one of them, particularly the momma I saw with two babies. Grizzlies are seriously large bears. 

Edited February 2, 2023 by njsmom

[emd138]

njsmom, we have black bears in our development that have learned to open unlocked doors and keep having to be relocated.  I can't image it with camping!  We have sewage grinder pumps here, and a bear tossed a concrete slab that was over 100 lbs down the hill, and destroyed my pump.  They are very powerful animals.  Distance is good!

[Sigyn]

8 hours ago, emd138 said:

njsmom, we have black bears in our development that have learned to open unlocked doors and keep having to be relocated.  I can't image it with camping!  We have sewage grinder pumps here, and a bear tossed a concrete slab that was over 100 lbs down the hill, and destroyed my pump.  They are very powerful animals.  Distance is good!

a 100 lb concrete slab? and they have learned to unlock doors? They are bionic bears!

 

When I visited Alaska many years ago, I went with my then-boyfriend and we visited his sister, who had a B&B in Homer. She had deep scratches on her back door from local bears, who would try to get into the house. She took it in stride but I, a Southern California beach girl at the time, was dumbfounded at the idea of living in an environment where bears just ambled up to your back door and pawed at the wood to get inside. 

Edited February 2, 2023 by njsmom
verb tenses

[Mary229]

We were on a trail in Yellowstone when we overheard the people in front of us say they were going down to the meadow to pet the bison.  We turned and left quickly.  By time we encountered a ranger to report the damage had been done 😞

[millennial]

Budget option - Buy some salmon and take a walk in the woods.

[Gardyloo]

On 1/29/2023 at 6:40 PM, diesel1973 said:

no he did not come in my tent. I was in a one man tent and he ripped the top of tent off and got on top of me.I was on my stomach on a sleeping bag and he sunk his canine teeth into my shoulder. He let go for a minute and sunk his teeth in my shoulder again. That's when I decided to do something and started yelling for my nephew in the camper as he had a gun. When he opened the window of his camper he must have startled the bear and he ran off. Every article I have read had a different story and nobody talked to me. I guess tasting bad is a good thing!LOL 

Small world.  

 

Back in the early 1980s ('81 or '82 I think) four of us flew up to Upper Russian Lake (other end of the river) for some fishing.  The plane dropped us off on a sandbar at the top of the lake, behind which was a little slough where some exceedingly "ripe" red salmon were spawning and dying and making quite a scene of it.  Not surprisingly, fishing in the lake was a complete bust, but the scenery was great.

 

That night my friend and I were in our 2-person tent (the others were in their own tent) when in the wee hours I heard all the fish in the lagoon making a major ruckus.  Shortly after, I heard some snorting outside the tent, then something big bumped my arm, which was touching the inside of the nylon tent wall.  Then it bumped again.  I was quite awake at this point and was ruminating on the fact that the firearms we'd brought (a 9mm handgun and a shotgun with slugs) were both in the other tent.  Cool.

 

The bumping stopped and I heard the fish go nuts again.  Crisis passed.  In the morning I looked around the tent and found paw prints the size of dinner plates, i.e., from a full-grown brownie.   Good thing I had clean underwear.

[diesel1973]

It's funny because he bumped the side of the tent before he tore the top off. DNR measured between puncture wounds and estimated him to be 300-350#. A little bit out of my weight class!

[Sigyn]

21 hours ago, Gardyloo said:

Small world.  

 

Back in the early 1980s ('81 or '82 I think) four of us flew up to Upper Russian Lake (other end of the river) for some fishing.  The plane dropped us off on a sandbar at the top of the lake, behind which was a little slough where some exceedingly "ripe" red salmon were spawning and dying and making quite a scene of it.  Not surprisingly, fishing in the lake was a complete bust, but the scenery was great.

 

That night my friend and I were in our 2-person tent (the others were in their own tent) when in the wee hours I heard all the fish in the lagoon making a major ruckus.  Shortly after, I heard some snorting outside the tent, then something big bumped my arm, which was touching the inside of the nylon tent wall.  Then it bumped again.  I was quite awake at this point and was ruminating on the fact that the firearms we'd brought (a 9mm handgun and a shotgun with slugs) were both in the other tent.  Cool.

 

The bumping stopped and I heard the fish go nuts again.  Crisis passed.  In the morning I looked around the tent and found paw prints the size of dinner plates, i.e., from a full-grown brownie.   Good thing I had clean underwear.

good grief. that's scary as all get out.

 

19 hours ago, diesel1973 said:

It's funny because he bumped the side of the tent before he tore the top off. DNR measured between puncture wounds and estimated him to be 300-350#. A little bit out of my weight class!

wow. huge bear. I remember reading, several years ago, when a bear went into a tent when some scouts were camping and pulled a boy, around age 10, out of his tent and was dragging him into the woods with his head in his mouth when the scoutmaster heard something and went outside and made a commotion and stopped the bear. The boy survived, but had puncture wounds on his head. And I'm assuming a great fear of bears and camping for the rest of his life. Poor kid. 

[emd138]

On 2/2/2023 at 6:33 AM, njsmom said:

a 100 lb concrete slab? and they have learned to unlock doors? They are bionic bears!

 

When I visited Alaska many years ago, I went with my then-boyfriend and we visited his sister, who had a B&B in Homer. She had deep scratches on her back door from local bears, who would try to get into the house. She took it in stride but I, a Southern California beach girl at the time, was dumbfounded at the idea of living in an environment where bears just ambled up to your back door and pawed at the wood to get inside. 

 

Thankfully, they can only open unlocked doors, and of course it depends on the type of door "knob,"  haha!  My doors stay locked.  It is amazing what kind of things they can figure out.  When security told me that it was a bear that moved the slab, I thought he was crazy (and wrong), but the footprints the next day were enormous, along with the teeth marks in the pump.   I think that was the last bear they relocated, and it was over 400 lbs.

 

I can definitely see them pawing at the door if they smell something good!    

[diesel1973]

Don't think locks are going to stop them. If they want to get in, they will get in!

[donaldsc]

On 2/2/2023 at 3:32 AM, emd138 said:

There are some insanely "tame" bears there.  We had one walking through some pretty good crowds when we were there.

 

They are not tame.  They are human habituated. There is a difference.  

 

" the process of people or animals becoming used to something, so that they no longer find it unpleasant or think it is a threat: Increased sightings of coyotes are the result of habituation, as coyotes become accustomed to humans and unafraid of them."

 

DON

[emd138]

8 minutes ago, donaldsc said:

 

They are not tame.  They are human habituated. There is a difference.  

 

" the process of people or animals becoming used to something, so that they no longer find it unpleasant or think it is a threat: Increased sightings of coyotes are the result of habituation, as coyotes become accustomed to humans and unafraid of them."

 

DON

I agree, that is why I put tame in quotes.  Thanks for the better terminology!

 

[donaldsc]

1 minute ago, emd138 said:

I agree, that is why I put tame in quotes.  Thanks for the better terminology!

 

 

Missed the quotes.  Sorry.

 

DON

[Sigyn]

On 2/3/2023 at 7:18 PM, emd138 said:

 

Thankfully, they can only open unlocked doors, and of course it depends on the type of door "knob,"  haha!  My doors stay locked.  It is amazing what kind of things they can figure out.  When security told me that it was a bear that moved the slab, I thought he was crazy (and wrong), but the footprints the next day were enormous, along with the teeth marks in the pump.   I think that was the last bear they relocated, and it was over 400 lbs.

 

I can definitely see them pawing at the door if they smell something good!    

ah okay. I misread that. It would be pretty freaky if they taught themselves to unlock doors. Imagine?!

[Ferry_Watcher]

If anyone finds themselves in eastern Washington State, be sure to stop by the Bear Research Center at Washington State University (WSU).  They have quite a few grizzly bears.

 

https://bearcenter.wsu.edu/bear-photos-videos/

[diesel1973]

I'll pass!

[thermal]

I saw a film called 'Grizzly Man' and during parts of it, Timothy Treadwell got very close to touching a few Alaska grizzly's.  There was one scene where a grizzly was within two or three feet of him.  

[Northern Aurora]

On 3/28/2023 at 7:53 PM, thermal said:

I saw a film called 'Grizzly Man' and during parts of it, Timothy Treadwell got very close to touching a few Alaska grizzly's.  There was one scene where a grizzly was within two or three feet of him.  

And those of us who live in Alaska remember what happened to Treadwell and his girlfriend.  For those who do not they were both dismembered and eaten by a bear.  Audio recording documented the attack.

[donaldsc]

On 2/5/2023 at 6:37 PM, donaldsc said:

 

Missed the quotes.  Sorry.

 

DON

On 2/5/2023 at 6:25 PM, donaldsc said:

 

They are not tame.  They are human habituated. There is a difference.  

 

" the process of people or animals becoming used to something, so that they no longer find it unpleasant or think it is a threat: Increased sightings of coyotes are the result of habituation, as coyotes become accustomed to humans and unafraid of them."

 

DON

 

We have coyotes who wander throughout neighborhood in the morning eating small dogs.  The coyotes were in our neighborhood before they built our houses so I guess that they have a right to eat a few dogs but people do get a bit miffed when their chihuahua goes missing.  I am not a dog person but if I were a chihuahua would be the last breed that I would get.

 

DON

[diesel1973]

I guess tasting bad is a good thing!

[suzzek]

If you want to read a good book, The Night of the Grizzlies  is fascinating! A true story that happened in Glacier National Park.  My sister eventually nannied for one of the survivors, who later married and had children.

[pink845]

Double take.  Pet a grizzly bear. Last year driving between Banff and Radium Hot Springs, we had to stop so many times to avoid bears, brown, and black.  They were so close to our SUV.  I was terrified. But, of course, there were silly people outside their vehicles trying to snag that special photo.  These are not bunny rabbits.