Wild One

Every morning for a week we found large grizzly tracks and fresh digging along our grizzly enclosures perimeter. I followed the tracks that circled our grizzly’s enclosure and then lead NW into the dense woods. I never saw the wild grizzly but he was there watching. We would feed in the morning and then an hour later we would come up to the enclosure to find fresh tracks and new holes dug. The situation was quite dangerous because the wild grizzly saw our two male grizzlies as intruders in his territory. The wild grizzly had also broken into a farmer’s backyard and destroyed his solar panels. In addition two other farms reported seeing fresh tracks and were afraid for their livestock. So the decision was made to trap him.

We set a large culvert trap at a slight 15 degree angle on a dark rainy night. The trap was baited with a stillborn filly, sardines, and molasses. The next morning we had ourselves a very upset male grizzly! We were really surprised that we had caught the grizzly because usually culvert traps are ineffective against grizzlies. The reason for this is because grizzlies are incredibly intelligent so you usually have to use a leg snare to trap them. We were successful because the wild grizzly was only 2.5yrs old. This is exactly the time when the mother abandons her young. So the inexperienced bear gave in to his stomach more easily than an older bear would have. We transported the bear way up into the mountains and then tranquilized him so that we could attach ear tags. When the grizzly regained consciousness we released him and watched him disappear into the boreal forest.