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.
Tracking Gobi Grizzlies.
On the floor of the gorge, the bear's trail merged with the scat and tracks of wolves, black-tailed gazelles, wild camels, wild asses, and the region's wild cliff-dwelling goats with horns like knobby-scimitars - Siberian ibex. It was a reminder that the reserve was established to protect not just mazaalai but an entire community of desert fauna whose rich variety of big mammals had been a revelation ever since my first trip to the Gobi.
...........The remains of a black-tailed gazelle lay among the tamarisk stems at one side. More bones and scraps of hide were scattered in the powdery white alkali dust that forms around the evaporating edges of the Gobi's rare springs. On the scree slope just above, an ibex skull and horns rested facing the water hole as if placed there to keep watch.
At least two of the sets of bear tracks looked relatively fresh. A compact pile of scat among them consisted almost entirely of darkling beetle remains - further evidence, perhaps, of how Gobi bears adapt when a rainless spell, such as the desert had experienced for months now, suppresses early springtime plant growth.
...........We called a halt to our trek after coming upon the body of an ibex surrounded by torn-off tufts of its fur and bear droppings packed with more of the hairs.
This was the narrowest part of the canyon so far - a bottleneck ideal for ambush by a predator. In the movie running through my brain, it was wolves that had made the kill; their scat lay very close by. After them came gimlet-eyed ravens and vultures. Next, the bear, arriving at the gorge to slake its thirst, followed its nose to the carcass and chased off the birds to take its turn scavenging. In reality, the carcass was too dismembered to reveal how the animal died. The marrow in its leg bones, normally white and fatty, was red and runny, a sign of malnutrition. The ibex might have been easy prey, and the killer wasn't necessarily either wolves or bear. It could have been microscopic disease organisms. Or it could have been one of the snow leopards living among the Gobi's mountains, which include summits close to 9,000 feet high. These nocturnal hunters with a whisper-soft tread descend to many of the same oases used by the rest of the area's wildlife. Nor could we rule out the possibility that the ibex was brought down by a similar predator within the reserve: the Eurasian lynx. Weighing as much as sixty-five pounds, this larger cousin of the Canadian lynx is a successful ungulate predator as well as a hunter of smaller mammals and birds.
Bears of the Himalayan Mountains
