There is a world somewhere between reality and fiction. Although ignored by many, it is very real and so are those living in it. This forum is about the natural world. Here, wild animals will be heard and respected. The forum offers a glimpse into an unknown world as well as a room with a view on the present and the future. Anyone able to speak on behalf of those living in the emerald forest and the deep blue sea is invited to join.
02-02-2016, 06:48 PM( This post was last modified: 02-02-2016, 06:48 PM by brotherbear )
The Grizzly Almanac by Robert H. Busch.
Alberta bear biologist Gordon Stenhouse once watched a large grizzly running effortlessly down a steep mountain slope carrying a 300-pound sheep in its mouth. "The power of these animals is just awesome," he says ( quoted in Struzik, 1999 ).
02-02-2016, 06:50 PM( This post was last modified: 02-02-2016, 06:52 PM by brotherbear )
The Grizzly Book by Jack Samson.
The Grizzly Book by Jack Samson.
Monarch - The Big Bear by Ernest Thompson Seton.
Strong ropes, strong chains and bands of steel were at hand, with chloroform, lest he should revive too soon. Through holes in the roof with infinite toil they chained him, bound him - his paws to his neck, his neck and breast and hind legs to a bolted beam. Then raising the door, they dragged him out, not with horses - none would go near - but with a windlass to a tree; and fearing the sleep of death, they let him now revive.
Chained and double chained, frenzied, foaming, and impotent, what words can tell the state of the fallen Monarch? They put him on a sled, and six horses with a long chain drew it by stages to the plain, to the railway. They fed him enough to save his life. A great steam-derrick lifted Bear and beam and chain on to a flatcar, a tarpaulin was spread above his helpless form; the engine puffed, pulled out; and the Grizzly King was gone from his ancient hills.
So they brought him to the great city, the Monarch born, in chains. They put him in a cage not merely strong enough for a lion, but thrice as strong, and once a rope gave way as the huge one strained his bonds. "He is loose," went the cry, and an army of onlookers and keepers fled; only the small man with the calm eye and the big man of the hills were stanch, so the Monarch was still held.
Free in the cage, he swung round, looked this way and that, then heaved his powers against the triple angling steel and wrenched the cage so not a part of it was square. In time he clearly would break out. They dragged the prisoner to another that an elephant could not break down, but it stood on the ground, and in an hour the great beast had a cavern into the earth and was sinking out of sight, till a stream of water sent after him filled the hole and forced him again to view. They moved him to a new cage made for him since he came - a hard rock floor, great bars of nearly two-inch steel that reached up nine feet and then projected in for five. The Monarch wheeled once around, then rearing, raised his ponderous bulk, wrenching those bars, unbreakable, and bent and turned them in their sockets with one heave till the five-foot spears were pointed out, and then sprang to climb. Nothing but spikes and blazing brands in a dozen ruthless hands could hold him back. The keepers watched him night and day till a stronger cage was made, impregnable with a steel above and rocks below.
02-03-2016, 02:38 PM( This post was last modified: 02-03-2016, 02:39 PM by brotherbear )
The Grizzly Book by Jack Samson - The Trouble with Grizzlies by Thomas Hardin.
With the hide off, the carcass of a grizzly looked like the naked body of a grotesque and tremendously powerful man. The great ropes of muscle show where the bears get their strength. They can crush the head of a moose or a buffalo with one blow, literally powder the backbone of the largest steer. I once saw a rather small female grizzly uproot the stump of a dead timberline tree with one smooth, effortless pull. apparently she did it as easily as a tractor would have done.
Grizzlies have been known to carry away the entire carcass of a bull elk that would weigh from 700 to 800 pounds, and to drag that of a bull moose for a mile - and a big bull will weigh 1,200 or 1,300. When a grizzly puts his mind to it, he can break open the door of a trapper's cabin as if he were an animated battering ram. For his size, he is one of the most powerful beasts that walks the earth.
02-03-2016, 02:40 PM( This post was last modified: 02-03-2016, 02:41 PM by brotherbear )
The grizzly Book by Jack Samson - Hunting the Grizzly by Ned W. Frost.
Incidentally, I had an interesting experience with "Old Four-Toes" myself which showed the tremendous strength of the animal. An eastern sportsman I was guiding had wounded a big bull elk and two days later when we finally found the body, the meat was spoiled so we removed only the scalp and antlers. After two or three days' time, when hunting in the same locality, we stopped to see if any animal had been working on the carcass. Much to our surprise, the carcass was gone but there were no tracks or blood signs in the tall grass of the meadow where it had lain. After considerable scouting about, I found some signs on a log several hundred yards up the hill. Beyond that point, through some timber, I found what remained of the elk, and there also I found a four-toed track. How that old grizzly had carried that full-grown elk carcass without leaving some sort of a trail in the tall grass has always remained a mystery to me.
I will give you another example of grizzly strength. My father, brother, and I cut a heavy pine log to be used as a drag for a bear-trap. It was all we could do to drag it a few yards and slip the rung of a forty-two pound, number six, bear-trap over the little end. We set the trap near a raging stream in full spring flood. The trap was sprung the first night and the drag mark of the trap and log led into the swift water, down whose flood creast were drifting uprooted trees nearly one hundred feet long in almost endless numbers. Father bade his trap and bear goodbye, for it seemed that no living animal, handicapped with such weight, could survive that torrent. A cold spell came along and the water fell several feet, so that father, by picking a place where there were several channels, could ford the stream on a large horse. The trap and long-trail were picked up on the other side almost straight across, and the bear was soon located.
02-03-2016, 02:42 PM( This post was last modified: 02-03-2016, 02:43 PM by brotherbear )
Man Meets Grizzly by Young and Beyers.
No one doubts the grizzly's strength: old-timers, trappers, and hunters tell of grizzlies killing buffalo and dragging or carrying the huge and heavy carcass some distance over rough terrain, then burying it. Many stories have been told of the grizzly catching a buffalo or steer by the head with one paw and with the other breaking its neck. One stroke of his paw can tear the hide and ribs from a victim. However, despite his great strength, the bear has not always been victorious in these encounters. One story, for which I cannot vouch, concerns a powerful bull that was charged by a bear in a forest and, retaliating, struck his horns into his assailant, pinning him to a tree. In this situation both were later found dead, the bull from starvation, the bear from wounds. I know of a Kodiak bear and a bull moose that, joined in a standoff battle, dueled each other to death. A bull or moose cannot be easily killed unless the bear surprises the animal and strikes first. All three - moose, bull, and grizzly - have a terrible tenacity that matches their strength
02-03-2016, 07:34 PM( This post was last modified: 02-03-2016, 07:36 PM by brotherbear )
California Grizzly by Tracy I. Storer and Lloyd P. Tevis, Jr.
The bodily framework of the grizzly is substantial, to support the weight of the animal; yet the bear has a greater degree of flexibility in its movements than is possible in many other sturdily built mammals. This freedom of motion is a correlated function of the bones, ligaments, and muscles. The skeleton of a bear - grizzly or other kind - is much like that of related carnivores, but there are many small differences.
A noticeable massiveness is evident in all the bones. The neck vertebrae are large but are capable of much rotation movement, the spinous processes along the back on the dorsal vertebrae are heavy, and the shoulder blade is ample. The limbs are of nearly equal length. Both fore and hind feet are fully plantigrade: the entire surface of each foot comes in contact with the ground as the bear walks. The bones used in lifting or extending the feet ( the pisiform on the fore foot, the calcaneum on the hind ) are larger than in some other carnivores. All bones of the legs, both front and rear, are separate. In the front leg, the radius and ulna are of nearly equal size for easy and powerful rotation of that member; and in the hind leg, the fibula, which is involved in twisting movements, is free and larger in relation to the tibia than in mammals unable to make such movements. These skeletal features, together with the muscles attached to them, give the bears dexterity in using their limbs - more or less in the manner of human beings ( fig. 11 ).
02-04-2016, 07:39 AM( This post was last modified: 02-04-2016, 07:40 AM by brotherbear )
The Beast That Walks Like Man by Harold McCracken.
When a grizzly made a kill, of some other wild animal or domestic stock, he would generally drag it to some secluded spot to enjoy the feast. Large bears have been known to transport a full-grown elk or even a hefty steer a mile or more over rough and difficult country. Their strength is amazing. They did not make such a kill everyday. Sometimes it was infrequent. On such happy occasions, however, he ate very heartily; and, not being able to consume it all at one sitting, Old Ephraim gave serious attention to preserving and protecting what was left for future meals. After satisfying his immediate appetite he would cover up the cache with leaves or even parts of dead trees, sometimes digging out a shallow hole in the ground beforehand. Then he would wander away, to return for the next meal, or he might lie down near enough to protect it from trespassers.
02-04-2016, 07:43 AM( This post was last modified: 02-04-2016, 07:43 AM by brotherbear )
Fortress of the Grizzlies by Dan Wakeman and Wendy Shymanski:
When you are traveling in bear country, whether the residents are grizzly or black, it is extremely important that you understand bear behavior. Even the smallest bears are extremely strong, and if a careless approach spooks an animal, it can injure or kill you. Learn as much as possible about bears before you venture out.
02-04-2016, 07:58 AM( This post was last modified: 02-04-2016, 07:59 AM by brotherbear )
Grizzly Years by Doug Peacock.
I edged over the rise and froze: a huge dark grizzly shook the remains of a buffalo carcass in the air, much as a dog might play with a stick. From a hundred feet away I watched, motionless in the fading light.
The bear slammed the carcass to the ground and circled, stamping his forepaws on the bones and hide. I waited until his back was turned, then retreated a hundred yards and climbed a steep timbered hillside. I could see the flash of his claws as he turned over the dead buffalo. These were much longer than a black bear's, maybe four inches long. The grizzly looked almost black in the dim light. His shoulders, nearly as high as mine, were separated by a mound of muscle, which rippled as the bear pawed and slid the heavy carcass along the ground. His head was massive, scooped out below the eyes, and he must have weighed well over six hundred pounds.
02-04-2016, 08:18 AM( This post was last modified: 02-04-2016, 08:19 AM by brotherbear )
The Grizzly by Enos A. Mills.
He has extraordinary strength. I have known him to drag the carcass of a cow or a steer of twice his own weight. In several instances this was dragged up the mountain-side over fallen logs, yet it was apparently moved without extraordinary effort.
02-04-2016, 07:30 PM( This post was last modified: 02-04-2016, 07:42 PM by brotherbear )
Published April 17, 2014
The Gobi is Earth’s fifth largest desert, sprawling across half a million square miles of southern Mongolia and northern China. It sees temperatures of minus 40°F in winter and 120 in summer, and gets just two to eight inches of annual rainfall. Some years parts of the region receive no rain at all. Windstorms sweep through day and night, with gusts strong enough to send a tent sailing away over the horizon. When winds are calm, the Gobi’s immense silence can feel as overwhelming as the heat.
Signs of life come as a surprise in this sun-blasted, wind-scoured landscape. Peering through binoculars, I at first see just barren rock rising in ranks of mountains. The only things that move are dust devils and the shimmering heat.
Slowly, as I discover where to look, animal forms emerge: A lizard rests in the thin shade of a saxaul shrub. A saker falcon lifts off from a distant cliffside. Gerbils poke their heads from burrows.
But many days pass before I finally lay eyes on the animal I crossed half a world to see: a Gobi bear, among the rarest and least known large mammals on Earth. There are perhaps no more than two or three dozen left in the wild, and none live in captivity anywhere.
This male stops at an oasis to sip water, then rests nearby. Elated by our good luck and mesmerized by the sight, my companions and I watch the bear for two hours, from late afternoon to nightfall. Most bears become active toward day’s end, but this one remains oddly still. When he finally attempts to walk, his gait seems pained and slow. He must have traveled a great distance to reach water, I tell myself, and the journey might have left him exhausted and temporarily lame.
In reality, the bear is dying. A week later a ranger finds his body near the same oasis. The old male had likely emerged from hibernation in poor condition at a time when food plants were just starting to grow.
For those working to bolster the Gobi bear’s alarmingly low numbers, the death of even one individual underscores the urgency of their task. So too do the clear signs that boom times are at hand in Mongolia. Vast deposits of minerals, precious metals, and fossil fuels are being uncovered in the country, especially in its desert. Nearly a third of the nation’s income may soon come from a massive new copper and gold mine in the Gobi. What may one day rank as the world’s largest coal mine is under development in the desert as well. The suspected mineral wealth here is so great that industry players have taken to calling this land “Minegolia.”
While storm clouds darken the Gobi bear’s horizon, there are flickers of hope. The Mongolian government declared 2013 the “Year of Protecting the Gobi Bear,” with a promise of more money for conserving the species. The Mongolian public has embraced the beleaguered bear as a national treasure, all the more precious for its rarity. Not long ago a gold-mining comThe people of southwestern Mongolia have long known of the mysterious animal they called mazaalai, but credible reports were mixed with tall tales of a shaggy, humanlike creature roaming the wildest reaches of the desert. Not until 1943 did a Russian scientist-explorer confirm for the outside world that Gobi bears actually exist. Although they belong to the species Ursus arctos, commonly known as the brown bear or grizzly, their coats are often more bronze than brown and show blazes of white on the forequarters and neck. They also tend to be smaller than most North American grizzlies, whose living conditions are plush by comparison.pany sought access to protected land crucial to the bear’s survival. The government turned down the request, at least for now.
One genetic study suggests that the Gobi lineage is an ancient one, closer than any other to the ancestral brown bear, which first arose in Asia. Experts originally considered Gobi bears a distinct subspecies, gobiensis. However, they may turn out to be an isolated group of the subspecies isabellinus, still found in China’s Tien Shan mountains and the Himalaya.
02-07-2016, 09:59 PM( This post was last modified: 02-07-2016, 10:00 PM by brotherbear )
The Beast That Walks Like Man by Harold McCracken.
George Bird Grinnell, one of the most respected authorities on the western Indians, whose knowledge of these people was founded on long and intimate personal association with them, has the following to sayin his two-volume work, 'The Cheyenne Indians': "Stories are told of man-eating grizzly bears, that habitually preyed on the people, lying in wait for and capturing them, and even driving large camps away from favorite camping places. Such stories go back to a time before the coming of the whites, for the acquisition of horses and iron-pointed arrows tended to put the Indian more nearly on an equality with his brute enemy, than he was when the red man traveled afoot and his weapons were of stone. In primitive times every advantage was with the bear. It was swift of foot, enduring, and hard to kill. Its tough muscles, heavy fur, strong hide, and thick coating of fat were hardly to be pierced by the primitive arrow.
02-09-2016, 02:18 AM( This post was last modified: 02-09-2016, 02:19 AM by brotherbear )
California's Day of the Grizzly by William B. Secrest.
Fresno Morning Republican, Dec 7, 1919.
Here was an animal of omnivorous habit and hence well prepared for getting some sort of usable food almost anywhere he might go. Of tremendous strength which enabled a larger individual bear to kill a horse or an ox at one blow and to drag it away for storage. Of astonishing dexterity, which enabled him to pick up with claws as if with chop sticks, individual ants from beneath an overturned log or boulder. Of such quickness that he could catch trout from a stream or ground squirrels from a burrow. Of such speed that he could outrun a horse for short distances on level ground and long distances on rough ground. And of such tenacity of life that he has been repeatedly reported as fighting for some time after being shot through the heart. Having all these things in his favor, why should he disappear from earth in less than half a century? There are several reasons, the most important of which center on that enemy of nature, civilized man.
BEARS of the last frontier by Chris Morgan... Bears are among the most intelligent mammals on earth, but they are wildly misunderstood. We set out to immerse ourselves in their world and to further understand these majestic animals on their own ground. Our journey covered more than 3,000 miles by road and many thousands more by bush plane. Alaska harbors all three of North America's bear species, from 300 pound blacki bears to polar and brown bears weighing well over half a ton. It is home to the highest mountains on the continent, vast glaciers, immense forests, and a level of isolation to be found nowhere else in the United States.
Survival Skills of Bears
