Bear Jammin'!

*Critters we’ve seen on our 2013 trip so far:  bison, pronghorn, elk, white-tail deer, Uinta ground squirrel, coyote, snowshoe hare, grizzly bear, moose, wolf, red fox, black bear, bighorn sheep, mountain goat, mule deer
*Birds we’ve seen on our 2013 trip so far: osprey, pheasant, magpie, raven, Canada geese, mountain bluebird, grouse, golden eagle, bald eagle, American avocet, sandhill crane, red-tailed hawk, cliff swallow, northern flicker

[Click on any photo to enlarge.] 

What’s a bear jam?  Well, it’s a traffic jam caused by tourists who stop (sometimes in the middle of the road!) to look at bears that may be visible from the road.  (Actually this occurs with just about any animal.)   Law enforcement, bear management,

and sometimes volunteers help to keep the traffic flowing and the people at the 100 yard safe distance.  Earlier this summer we helped out on one of those jams for a couple of hours which meant I couldn’t get any pictures of the adorable cubs-of-the-year (meaning born this year).  There

seems to have been an abundance of bear sightings this year, and fortunately we have seen several.  Though I didn’t get pics of those during the bear jam we worked, I did get pics of them on a different occasion.  The cinnamon colored black bear with her two cubs (one black and one brown) have been

seen quite a few times only a few miles from our campground.  On this particular day, not only did we watch the black cub climbing a tree, but we watched as the brown cub climbed one tree and then tried desperately to reach backwards toward the tree behind!  They are so cute and fun to watch!

 

Early one morning we were heading towards Lamar Valley, and a few miles before the Tower-Roosevelt Junction, we spied a black bear on the hillside just above the pullout.  There were only a couple other cars parked, but fortunately no one was getting out of their car because we were much closer than the 100 yard limit.  I stood on the seat, shooting pictures from the sunroof, as we watched this beautiful creature meander and graze along the hillside.

 

Later that morning as we made our way back from, we ran into a traffic jam at Elk Creek near the Petrified Tree.  Most of the folks were off the road, parked along the shoulder, and there were lots of them.  The attraction?  The black black bear with her two cinnamon

colored cubs!  They were down in the meadow, all of us a safe distance away, watching as they grazed and eventually they wandered off crossing over and climbing on the fallen trees.

 

As we continued our ride back home, we even spied a grizzly!  This turned out to be quite a day for bear jammin’!!

 

Yellowstone Tidbits:

• Black bear: Boar (male) weighs 210-315 lbs., sow (female) weighs 135-200 lbs., standing 3 ft. at the shoulders when on all fours
• Grizzly bear:  Boar (male) weighs 300-700 lbs., sow (female) weighs 200-400 lbs., standing 3 - 3-1/2 ft. at shoulders when on all fours
• Much of Yellowstone was shaped by glaciers, and scientists estimate that 18,000 years ago most of the park was under 4,000 feet of ice.
• Yellowstone National Park contains about half the world’s active geysers.