The glacier bear is an Alaskan animal, which occupies the seaward front
of the Mount St. Elias Range, about Yakutat Bay, and thence southeast
to Glacier Bay and a short distance beyond toward the interior. The
popular name of this bear was well chosen, as its home is in the
midst of innumerable stupendous glaciers. Here, where the contours of
gigantic mountain ranges are being steadily remade by glaciers, Nature
appears to have begun the evolution of a new kind of bear. That the
task is in progress is evidenced by the excessive variation in color,
scarcely two individuals being the same.
The food of this bear consists largely of mice, ground squirrels, and
marmots, which it digs from their burrows on the high mountain slopes.
Its food is varied by salmon during the spawning season and by various
herbs and berries during the summer. The winters in the home of the
glacier bear are less severe than across the range in the interior, but
are so long and stormy that the bear must spend more than six months
each year in hibernation.
Owing to the remote and little-frequented region occupied by this bear,
little is known of its life history. For this reason it is important
that all sportsmen visiting its country bring back careful and detailed
records of their observations. Up to the present time so few white men
have killed glacier bears that a skin of one taken by fair stalking
is a highly prized trophy. As the glacier bear country becomes more
accessible, more stringent protection will be needed to prevent the
extermination of these unique animals.
=GRIZZLY BEAR= (=Ursus horribilis= and its relatives)
Recent research has shown that the popular terms grizzly or silver-tip
cover a group containing numerous species of large bears peculiar to
North America, some of which, especially in California, have become
extinct within the last 25 years. These bears vary much in size, some
about equaling the black bear and others attaining a weight of more
than 1,000 pounds. They vary in color from pale dull buffy to nearly
black, usually with lighter tips to the hairs, which produce the
characteristic grizzled or silver-tipped appearance upon which the
common names are based.
The strongest and most distinctive external character of the grizzlies
is the long, proportionately slender, and slightly curved claws on the
front feet, sometimes more than 3 inches long.
Grizzly bears have a wide range--from the Arctic coast of Alaska
southward, in a belt extending from the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific,
through western Canada and the United States, and thence along the
Sierra Madre of Mexico to southern Durango. They also occupy the
barren grounds of northern Canada, and vague reports of a large
brown bear in the interior of the Peninsula of Labrador indicate the
possibility of the existence there of an unknown species of grizzly.
From the days of the earliest explorers of the Rocky Mountain region
grizzly bears have borne the undisputed title of America’s fiercest
and most dangerous big game. In early days, having little fear of the
primitive weapons of the Indians, they were bold and indifferent to the
presence of man, and no higher badge of supreme courage and prowess
could be gained by a warrior than a necklace of grizzly claws.
Since the advent of white men with guns, conditions have changed so
adversely to the grizzlies that they have become extremely shy, and the
slightest unusual noise or other alarm causes them to dash away at a
lumbering, but surprisingly rapid, gallop. The deadly modern gun has
produced this instinctive reaction for self-preservation. It does not
mean, however, that grizzlies have lost their claim to the respect of
even the best of hunters. They are still considered dangerous, and even
in recent years experienced hunters have been killed or severely mauled
by them. They are much more intelligent than the black bear, and thus,
when wounded, are a more dangerous foe.
Like the black bear, the grizzlies are commonly nocturnal, but in
remote districts often wander about in search of food by day. They
roll over stones and tear open rotten wood in search of grubs and
insects. They also dig out ground squirrels and other rodents and eat a
variety of acorns and other wild nuts and fruits. As an offset to this
lowly diet, many powerful old grizzlies, from the Rocky Mountains to
California, have become notorious cattle-killers. They stalk cattle at
night, and, seizing their prey by the head, usually break its neck, but
sometimes hold and kill it by biting. These cattle-killing grizzlies
still occur on the Western ranges. One or more wily marauders of this
kind have run for years with a bounty of $1,000 on their heads.
Like other bears, grizzlies hibernate in winter, seeking small caves,
or other shelter, and sometimes digging a den in the ground. The young,
from one to four in number, are born in midwinter and are very small,
naked, and but partly developed at birth. They go about with the mother
throughout the summer and commonly den up with her the following
winter. Although full-grown grizzlies are ordinarily solitary in
habits, parties of from four to eight are sometimes seen. The object of
these curious but probably brief companion-ships is not known.
Grizzlies are disappearing so rapidly that it is very desirable that
they be placed on the list of game protected during part of the year,
except in the case of the few individuals which become stock-killers.
They are among the finest of native animals and their absence from the
rugged slopes of the western mountains would leave a serious gap in our
wild life.
=ALASKAN BROWN BEAR= (=Ursus gyas= and its relatives)
(_See frontispiece of this Magazine for the illustration of this
remarkable animal_)
The Alaskan brown bears form a group of gigantic animals peculiar to
North America and limited to the coast and islands of Alaska, from the
head of Norton Sound to the Sitka Islands. The group includes a number
of species, individuals of two of which, _Ursus gyas_, of the Alaska
Peninsula, and _Ursus middendorffi_, of Kodiak Island, sometimes attain
a weight of 1,500 pounds or more, and are not only the largest existing
bears, but are the largest living carnivores in the world. They can be
likened only to the great cave bears, which were the haunting terror
of primitive mankind during the “Old Stone Age” in Europe. Brown bears
still exist in Europe and Asia, but they form a distinct group of much
smaller animals than the American species.
The Alaskan brown bears vary much in color, from a dull golden
yellowish to a dusky brown, becoming almost black in some species.
In color some of the darker species are indistinguishable from the
great grizzlies, with which in places they share their range; but the
relatively shorter, thicker, and more strongly curved claws on the
front feet of the brown bears are distinctive.
As a rule they are inoffensive giants and take flight at the first sign
of man. The taint left by a man’s recent track or the faintest odor on
the passing breeze, indicating the proximity of their dreaded enemy, is
enough to start the largest of them in instant flight. Instances are
reported of their having attacked people wantonly, but such cases are
extremely rare. When wounded or suddenly surprised at close quarters,
the instinct of self-defense not infrequently incites them to attack
their enemy with furious energy. Many Indian and white hunters have
been killed or terribly mauled by them in such encounters. At close
quarters their great size, strength, and activity--astonishing for such
apparently clumsy beasts--render them terrific antagonists.
Some of the species occupy open, rolling, or hilly tundras, and others
live on the steepest and most rugged mountain slopes amid glaciers,
rock slides, and perpetual snow-banks. On the approach of winter all
retreat to dry locations, usually in the hills, where they dig dens in
the earth or seek other cover to which they retire to hibernate, and
here the young, usually two or three in number, are born. They usually
emerge from hibernation in April or early May and wander about over the
snow-covered hills and mountains. At this time their dark forms and
their great tracks in the snow are so conspicuous that hunters have
little difficulty in finding them.
Despite their size, brown bears devote much of their time to hunting
such game as mice, ground squirrels, and marmots, which they dig from
their burrows with extraordinary rapidity. During the salmon season,
when the streams swarm with fish, bears frequent the lowlands and make
trails along the watercourses, where they feed fat on this easy prey.
During the summer and fall these great carnivores have the strange
habit of grazing like cattle on the heavy grasslike growth of sedge in
the lowland flats and benches, and also of eating many other plants.
Although Alaska was long occupied by the Russians and has been a
part of our territory since 1867, not until 1898 was there any
definite public knowledge concerning the existence of these bears,
notwithstanding their size and abundance. Since that time they have
become well known to sportsmen and others as one of the wonders of
the remarkable region they occupy. Their comparatively limited and
easily accessible territory renders their future precarious unless
proper measures for their reasonable protection are continued. They
are certain to be exterminated near settlements; but there are ample
wild and inhospitable areas where they may range in all their original
freedom for centuries to come, provided man permits.
=AMERICAN BEAVER= (=Castor canadensis= and its subspecies)
When North America was first colonized, beavers existed in great
numbers from coast to coast, in almost every locality where trees
and bushes bordered streams and lakes, from near the Yukon Delta, in
Alaska, and the Mackenzie Delta, on the Arctic coast, south to the
mouths of the Colorado and the Rio Grande. Although now exterminated
from most of their former range in the eastern United States, they
still occur in diminished numbers over nearly all the remainder of
their original territory, even in the lower Rio Grande and the delta
of the Colorado. Their vertical distribution extends from sea-level to
above an altitude of 9,000 feet.
Beavers are heavily built, round-bodied animals, with powerful
chisel-shaped front teeth, short legs, fully webbed hind feet, and a
flat, scaly tail. They are covered with long, coarse hairs overlying
the short, dense, and silky underfur to which beaver skins owe their
value. Their range covers the northern forested parts of both Old
and New Worlds. The American species closely resembles in general
appearance its Old World relative, but is distinctly larger, averaging
30 to 40 pounds in weight, but sometimes attaining a weight of more
than 60 pounds. Owing to the different physical conditions in its wide
range, the American animal has developed a number of geographic races.
Beavers mate permanently and have from two to five young each
year. Their abundance and the high value of their fur exercised an
unparalleled influence on the early exploration and development of
North America. Beaver skins were the one ready product of the New World
which the merchants of Europe were eager to purchase. As a consequence
competition in the trade for these skins was the source of strong and
bitter antagonisms between individuals and companies, and even
caused jealous rivalries among the Dutch, English, and French colonies.
[Illustration: GRIZZLY BEAR]
[Illustration: AMERICAN BEAVER]
Disputes over the right to trade in certain districts often led to
bloodshed, and even to long wars, over great areas, where powerful
rival companies fought for the control of a new empire. This eager
competition among daring adventurers resulted in the constant extension
of trading posts through the North and West, until the vanguard of
civilization reached the far borders of the continent on the shores of
the Arctic and Pacific Oceans.
Among the fur traders the beaver skin became the unit of value by
which barter was conducted for all sorts of commodities. This usage
extended even throughout northern Alaska, where it was current among
the American fur traders until the discovery of gold there upset old
standards.
Beavers belong to the rodent family--a group of animals notable for
their weak mental powers. The beaver is the striking exception to the
rule, and its extraordinary intelligence, industry, and skill have long
excited admiration. It is scarcely entitled to the almost superhuman
intelligence many endow it with, yet it certainly possesses surprising
ability along certain lines. Furthermore, it can alter its habits
promptly when a change in environment renders this advantageous.
In wild places, where rarely disturbed, beavers are unsuspicious, but
where they are much trapped they become amazingly alert and can be
taken only by the most skillful trapping. They are very proficient in
building narrow dams of sticks, mud, and small stones across small
streams for the purpose of backing up water and making “beaver ponds.”
In the border of these ponds a conical lodge is usually constructed of
sticks and mud. It is several feet high and about 8 or 10 feet across
at the base.
The entrance is usually under water, and a passageway leads to an
interior chamber large enough to accommodate the pair and their
well-grown young. From the ponds the animals sometimes dig narrow
canals several hundred feet long back through the flats among the
trees. Having short legs and heavy bodies, and consequently being
awkward on land, beavers save themselves much labor by constructing
canals for transporting the sticks and branches needed for food and for
repairing their houses and dams.
Along the Colorado, lower Rio Grande, and other streams with high banks
and variable water level, beavers usually dig tunnels leading from an
entrance well under water to a snug chamber in the bank above water
level. Under the varying conditions in different areas they make homes
showing every degree of intergradation between the two types described.
Beavers live almost entirely on twigs and bark, and their gnawing
powers are surprising. Where small trees less than a foot in diameter
abound they are usually chosen, but the animals do not hesitate to
attack large trees. On the headwaters of the San Francisco River, in
western New Mexico. I saw a cottonwood nearly 30 inches in diameter
that had been felled so skillfully that it had fallen with the top in
the middle of a small beaver pond, thus assuring an abundance of food
for the animals at their very door.
In the cold northern parts of their range, where streams and ponds
remain frozen for months at a time, beavers gather freshly cut green
twigs, sticks, and poles, which they weight down with mud and stones on
the bottoms of ponds or streams near their houses, to be used for food
during the shut-in period.
The mud used by beavers in building dams and houses is scooped up and
carried against the breast, the front feet being used like hands. The
flat tail serves as a rudder when the animal is swimming or diving, and
to strike the surface of the water a resounding slap as a danger signal.
Beavers are usually nocturnal, but in districts where not disturbed
they sometimes come out to work by day, especially late in the
afternoon. Among the myriads of small streams and lakes in the great
forested area north of Quebec they are very plentiful; their dams and
houses are everywhere, sometimes four or five houses about one small
lake. Their well-worn trails lead through the woods near the lake
shores and frequently cross portages between lakes several hundred
yards apart.
Where beavers continue to occupy streams in settled districts, they
often make regular trails from a slide on the river bank back to
neighboring cornfields, where they feast on the succulent stalks and
green ears. They also injure orchards planted near their haunts, by
girdling or felling the trees. Within recent years laws for their
protection have been passed in many States, and beavers have been
reintroduced in a number of localities. They should not be colonized
in streams flowing through lands used for orchards or cornfields, nor
where the available trees are too few to afford a continuous food
supply.