A mother grizzly and her three cubs explore a beach at low tide. These cubs left their winter den only four months earlier, but they have already learned how to swim and dig for clams. Soon they will learn to catch salmon.
A mother grizzly and her three cubs explore a beach at low tide. These cubs left their winter den only four months earlier, but they have already learned how to swim and dig for clams. Soon they will learn to catch salmon.
Winter
If you’re a bear in the Great Bear Rainforest, life usually begins in December or January because that’s when cubs are born. Rainforest bears spend almost two-thirds of the year feeding themselves so that when they go back to their dens in late November or early December, they will have enough fat on them to survive until the following spring. That’s even more important if you’re a female bear about to have cubs, because your cubs will rely on the rich, fatty milk you produce for all their nourishment. Newborn bears aren’t much bigger than puppies when they appear in the cozy dry warmth of their mother’s den, but thanks to their mother’s milk, they grow fast. By the time they take their first sniff of fresh mountain air in early March or April, they’re already as big as footballs.
A grizzly cub with gravel on his nose helps his mother dig up fatty salmon eggs that have been laid in the spawning beds.
Most of the time bears like to return to the same dens year after year, though sometimes they build new ones. Often these dens are dug under the roots of old-growth trees and are about the size of a Smart Car, just big enough to house a mother bear with two to three cubs. The tree’s roots help anchor the earth so it’s easier for the bears to dig around them, and they protect the finished dens from winter avalanches. But unlike a Smart Car, bear dens don’t have windows, only a door covered with several meters of snow in winter. The snow insulates the den and makes it a warm and inviting place for a bear to sleep.
Adult bears living on the British Columbia coast spend most of the winter in their dens. They do get up now and then to stretch and keep their muscles active, and sometimes as spring approaches they even go outside for a short look around. Cubs also have to wake up sometimes and move around to feed. But it’s not until March, when the heavy snow starts to melt and the first hints of spring fill the air, that it’s finally time for them to go outside for good. Mothers always go first. They look in every direction to make sure it’s safe. Then the cubs follow, and for the first time in their lives they get to see the vast wilderness that will be their home.
A mother grizzly will spend three years with her cub exploring the rainforest and teaching a variety of life lessons, such as where the tastiest plants and best fishing spots are.
Later on in summer, plants in the Great Bear Rainforest grow so tall and thick that if you manage to break your way through them, they’ll fold up behind you as if you were never there. But in winter it’s different. Most of the shrubs have died back almost to nothing, and you can see some distance in almost every direction. Young bears getting their first taste of the rainforest will stick their noses into everything and romp and play like children in a playground. But they never wander far from their mothers, because even though it might look as if they’re playing, they’re really learning. During the three years grizzly cubs spend with their mothers, they take in everything she shows them. They learn what to eat, where to find it, what to be careful of and what to be scared of.
March is an unpredictable month in the rainforest. Sometimes it can be sunny and warm, and sometimes it can be cold, wet and windy. Sometimes a late snow will turn it white. When storms rush in from the Pacific or roar down from the mountains, the wind blows so hard that trees can break in half. It’s also so loud that sometimes bears can’t hear each other or anything else. But who needs sensitive ears when you have a world-class nose? Bears’ noses are so powerful they can smell food—or each other—kilometers away. Good thing too, because life can be dangerous for young bears. Even grizzlies. A grizzly cub can be attacked by cougars, wolves and even adult male grizzlies. This is why grizzly mothers always try to keep their cubs as far away from other bears as they can.
Finding food can be tricky too. In the early spring there’s not much to eat except for a few plants that have begun to sprout on the rainforest floor. But until the salmon start to run in fall, all rainforest bears, even grizzlies, depend on plants for almost all their nourishment. So the sooner they can find some to eat, the better. If you’re a bear, the warmer, more productive days of April and May can’t come quickly enough.
