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.
The Grizzly Bear... Their note of April 29, 1805, is as follows: Captain Lewis, who was on shore with one hunter, met, about eight o'clock, two white bears. Of the strength and ferocity of this animal the Indians had given us dreadful accounts. They never attack him but in parties of six or eight persons, and even then are often defeated with a loss of one or more of their party. Having no weapons but bows and arrows, and the bad guns with which the traders supply them, they are obliged to approach very near to the bear. As no wound, except through the head or heart, is mortal, they frequently fall a sacrifice if they miss their aim. He rather attacks than avoids a man, and such is the terror which he has inspired, that the Indians who go in quest of him paint themselves and perform all the superstitious rites customary when they make war on a neighboring nation.
The Grizzly Bear... a few quotes from this book; from the journal of Lewis and Clark: The legs are somewhat longer than those of the black bear and the talons and tusks much longer... add to which it is a more furious animal and very remarkable for the wounds which it will bear without dying. "Captain Clark and one of the hunters met this evening the largest brown bear we have seen. As they fired he did not attempt to attack, but fled with a most tremendous roar; and such was his extraordinary tenacity of life that, although five balls passed through his lungs, and he had five other wounds, he swam more than half across the river to a sand bar and survived twenty minutes... his liver, lungs, and heart much larger even in proportion to his size ( than a black bear ), the heart being equal to that of a large ox; his maw ten times larger. Though somewhat smaller than that killed a few days ago, he was a monstrous animal and a most terrible enemy. Our man shot him through the center of the lungs, yet he had pursued him furiously for half a mile, then returned more than twice that distance, and with his talons prepared himself a bed in the earth two feet deep and five feet long; he was perfectly alive when they found him, which was at least two hours after he had received the wound. The wonderful power of life which these animals possess renders them dreadful; their very track in the mud or sand, which we have sometimes found eleven inches long and seven and one-fourth inches wide, exclusive of the talons, is alarming; and we had rather encounter two Indians than meet a single brown bear. There is no chance of killing them by a single shot unless the ball goes through the brain, and this is very difficult on account of two large muscles which cover the side of the forehead and the sharp projection of the center of the frontal bone, which isalso thick."
The Grizzly Bear... May 14, 1805. Toward evening the men in the hindmost canoes discovered a large brown bear lying in the open grounds about 300 paces from the river. Six of them, all good hunters, immediately went to attack him, and concealing themselves by a small eminence, came unperceived within forty paces of him. Four of the hunters now fired and each lodged a ball in his body, two of them directly through the lungs. The furious animal sprang up open-mouthed upon them. As he came near, the two hunters who had reserved their fire gave him two wounds, one of which, breaking his shoulder, retarded his motion for a moment; but before they could reload he was so near that they were obliged to run to the river, and before they reached it he had almost overtaken them. Two jumped into the canoe, the other four separated, and concealed themselves in the willows, fired as fast as each could reload. They struck him several times, but instead of weakening the monster, each shot seemed only to direct him toward the hunter; till at last he pursued two of them so closely that they threw aside their guns and pouches and jumped down a perpendicular bank of twenty feet into the river. The bear sprang after them, and was within a few feet of the hindmost when one of the hunters on shore shot him in the head and finally killed him. They dragged him to the shore and found that eight balls had passed through him in different directions. The bear was old and the meat tough, so that they took the skin only."
(03-10-2016, 10:11 PM)Pckts Wrote: What bear could he mean by "red?"
The Grizzly Bear... They were of the species common to the upper part of the Missouri and might well be termed the variegated bear, for they are found occasionally of a black, grizzly, brown, or red color. There is every reason to believe them to be of precisely the same species. Those of different colors are killed together, as in the case of these two, as we found a white and bay associated together on the Missouri; and some nearly white were seen in this neighborhood by the hunters. Indeed, it is not common to find any two bears of the same color, and if the difference in color were to constitute a distinction of species, the number would increase to almost twenty.
The Grizzly Bear... Although the grizzly bear was thus discovered by Lewis and Clark in 1805, these explorers did not return to civilization until 1807, and even then their zoological records were not promptly worked up. It was not, therefore, until 1814 that any naturalist gave even tentative recognition to the discovery thus made. In that year, on the 4th of May, in his introductory address before the Literary and Philosophical Society of New York, Governor De Witt Clinton, speaking of the work which lay open to the coming naturalists of the country, referring to "the white, brown, or grizzly bear, the ferocious tyrant of the American woods," and spoke of it as "a nondescript, and a distinct animal from the polar bear, with which it is confounded." It ranged, he said, the country along the Missouri River where "it exists, the terror of the savages, the tyrant of all other animals, devouring alike man and beast and defying the attack of whole tribes of Indians."
The Grizzly Bear by William H. Wright ( 1909 )... There are two words, similar in sound, but differing in signification, which had been impartially applied to this animal; one of them was grisly, and means "savage-looking, fear-inspiring, terrible, horrid"; the other was grizzly, and means "grayish, or somewhat gray." If one may judge from the context of Lewis ans Clark's notes, they used the latter word with the latter meaning, but Ord evidently inclined to the belief that the first word had been used both with reason and intent, and he therefore gave to this species the name of Ursus horribilis.
The Grizzly Bear... Mr. Ord says: "This animal is the monarch of the country which he inhabits. The African lion or the tiger of Bengal are not more terrible or fierce. He is the enemy of man and literally thirsts for human blood. So far from shunning, he seldom fails to attack and even then to hunt him. The Indians make war upon these ferocious monsters with the same ceremonies as they do upon a tribe of their own species, and, in the recital of their victories, the death of one of them gives the warrior greater renown than the scalp of a human enemy. He possesses an amazing strength, and attacks without hesitation and tears to pieces the largest buffalo.
The Grizzly Bear... The following year, however, in Godman's "Natural History" we come upon an interesting document. The author, after saying that the grizzly bear "slaughters indiscriminately every creature whose speed or artifice is not sufficient to place them beyond his reach," mentions two grizzly bear cubs that had, some time before, been kept alive in the menagerie of Peale's ( afterward the Philadelphia ) Museum. "When first received, they were quite small, but speedily gave indications of that ferocity for which this species is so remarkable. As they increased in size they became exceedingly dangerous, seizing and rearing to pieces every animal they could lay hold of, and expressing great eagerness to get at those accidentally brought within sight of their cage by grasping the iron bars with their paws and shaking them violently, to the great terror of spectators, who felt insecure while witnessing such displays of their strength.
The Grizzly Bear... So much for the early history of the grizzly. It is not much, but it is all we have. Lewis and Clark's observations are the basis of it, repeated with slight variations and considerable embellishments in regard to ferociousness and bloodthirstiness by each after writer. Occasionally one of these adds an original observation or a hearsay anecdote. Then these in turn are repeated and embellished. Meanwhile, the grizzly had been seized upon as a literary godsend in another quarter. To the romancers, the discovery of an Ursus horribilis was like the throwing open to settlement to locate quarter sections. Captain Mayne Reid was the hero of the movement. Jenkins, Lawrence, and a host of others preceded and followed him. Kit Carson ( and Audubon ) wrote reliable and was not listened to. Jim Bridger told whoppers and was believed.
The Grizzly Bear... James Capen Adams says: "I frequently saw him ( the grizzly ); he was to be found, I knew, in the bushy gorges in all directions, and sometimes, in my hunts, I would send a distant shot after him; but, as a general rule, during this first winter, I paid him the respect to keep out of his way; and he seemed somewhat ceremonious in return. Not by any means that he feared me; but he did not invite the combat, and I did not venture it." Later on he "considered it a point of honor to give battle in every case." The grizzly, he says, is "the monarch of American beasts, and, in many respects, the most formidable animal in the world to be encountered. In comparison with the lion of Africa and the tiger of Asia, though these may exhibit more activity and bloodthirstiness, the grizzly is not second in courage, and excels them in power. Like the regions which he inhabits, there is a vastness in his strength which makes him a fit companion for the monster trees and rocks of the Sierras, and places him, if not the first, at least in the first rank of all quadrupeds.
The Grizzly Bear - James Capen Adams says: "There are several varieties of the grizzly bear; or, to speak more properly, perhaps, the species has a wide range, extending to the British possessions on the north, to New Mexico on the south, and from the eastern spurs of the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Ocean. His size, general appearance, and character vary with the part of this great region in which he is found; for, although courageous and ferocious in the Rocky Mountains, he is there neither so large nor so terrible as in the Sierra Nevadas, where he attains his greatest size and strength. The grizzly of the Rocky Mountains seldom, if ever, reaches the weight of a thousand pounds; the color of his hair is almost white; he is more disposed to attack men than the same species in other regions, and has often been known to follow upon a human track for several hours at a time. Among hunters he is known as the Rocky Mountain white bear, to distinguish him from other varieties. The California grizzly sometimes weighs as much as two thousand pounds. He is of a brown color, sprinkled with grayish hairs. When arousedhe is, as has been said before, the most terrible of all animals in the world to encounter, but ordinarily will not attack man except under peculiar circumstances. The grizzly of Washington and OregonTerritories resembles the bear of California, with the exception that he rarely attains so large a size and has a browner coat. His hair is more disposed to curl and is thicker, owing to the greater coldness of the climate. He is not so savage, and can be hunted with greater safety than either the California or Rocky Mountain bear. In New Mexico the grizzly loses much of his strength and power, and upon the whole, is rather a timid and spiritless animal."
The Grizzly Bear... Ben, after never known the world under any other guise, accepted it frankly as he found it. He not only did not have to unlearn the habits of the savage, but seems never to have developed them, at least not toward his master ( James Capen Adams ). He was never chained, slept for the most part in Adam's company, and when at last the ultimate test of allegiance was unexpectedly presented to him, he took sides unhesitatingly with his adopted master against his own relations. Adams, while accompanied by Ben Franklin, was attacked by a wounded grizzly. Ben instantly joined in the fight, and, though himself badly bitten, saved his master's life. From that time on he was the apple of Adam's eye, his inseparable companion, and of all living beings on earth the best beloved.
The Grizzly Bear... Ben Franklin was caught, as a small cub, in the spring of 1854; Lady Washington, as a larger cub in 1853, and Samson, as a large bear, in the winter of 1854-5; that is, if Adams was truthful in his statements to me, as I thought and still think he was. As to Samson's weight, my recollection is that Adams said he had had him weighed on a hay scales. His show bills in San Francisco gave fifteen hundred pounds as his weight and I never heard it disputed, but as he was doubtless the big bear exhibited in New York, it is possible that the exact weight could be ascertained there.
A Historic Grizzly by Bob Nolin ( 2007 )... A couple of days later Clark collected his first grizzly. They knew of black bears from back east, but this was their first experience dealing with an animal so large, powerful, strong, aggressive and willing to fight back at a moments notice. Their many encounters put them on edge, always looking over their shoulders, especially in the Great Falls area of Montana where the fearless animal proved to be the Corps' nemesis. The Corps was very fortunate to escape unscathed. Lewis made the comment that it was easier to fight two Indians than one grizzly.
Humans and bears - Wild encounters
