Watched by Wild Animals

by Enos A. Mills

But finally an experienced old trapper went into her territory and announced in advance his determination to stay until he got the Echo Mountain grizzly. He set a steel trap in the head of a little ravine and placed a cake of half-burned, highly scented honey just beyond the trap. The mother and the cubs came, and apparently she had had a hard time making them sit down and wait until she examined the trap. To the amazement of the trapper she had climbed down the precipitous rocks behind the trap and procured the honey without passing over the trap.

Knowing that she was in the lower part of her territory, he one day set three large traps in three narrow places on the trail which she used in retreating up the mountain. The uppermost of these he set in the edge of the little lake at the point where she invariably came out of the water in crossing it. He then circled and came below her. Away she retreated. The first trap was detected two or three leaps before she reached it. Turning aside, she at once proceeded to the summit of the range over a new route. The following day the trapper was seen moving his outfit to other scenes.

Two near-by ranchers tried to get the bear by hunting. The latter part of September they invaded her territory with dogs. The second day out the dogs picked up her trail. She fled with the yearling cubs toward the summit of the range over a route with which she was familiar. Pausing at a rugged place she defied the dogs for a time, the cubs meanwhile keeping on the move. She continued her retreat at a surprising speed for a three-legged bear. The thin snow covering indicated that she ran at something of a gallop, making long, lunging leaps.

About a mile beyond her first affray with the dogs the mother swam with the cubs across a small mountain lake and paused in the willows on the farther shore. Two of the dogs swam boldly after them. Just before they reached the farther shore this daring mother turned back to meet them and succeeded in killing both. One of the other dogs had made his way round the lake and audaciously charged the cubs in the willows. They severely injured him but he made his escape. On went the bears. The hunters reached the lake and abandoned pursuit.

The next year another hunt with hounds was launched. There were a dozen or more dogs. The cubs, now more than two years old, were still with the mother. The hounds started them on the slope of Echo Mountain. They at once headed for the heights. After a run of three or four miles they struck their old route, retreated as before, and again swam the lake, but continued their way on up the range.

At timberline there were clusters of thickly matted, low-growing trees with open spaces between. Closely pressed, the bears made a stand. Unfamiliar with timberline trees, two of the dogs in dodging the bears leaped into the matted growths. With feet half entangled they were caught by the bears before they could make the second quick move. The mother bear killed one dog with a single stroke of her forepaw and the cubs wrecked the other. The mother and cubs then charged so furiously that the remaining dogs retreated a short distance. Mother and cubs turned and again fled up the slope.

The hounds were encouraged by the near-coming men again to take up pursuit. It was nearly night when the bears made another stand on the summit, where they beat off the dogs before the hunters came up. They then made their way down ledges so rocky and precipitous that the dogs hesitated to follow. Descending two thousand feet into the forest of Wild Basin on the other side of the range, they escaped. Evidently the mother grizzly had planned this line of retreat in advance.

About a month later I saw the Echo Mountain grizzly on the western side of the range, in her home territory. She was ever alert—stopping, looking, listening, and scenting frequently. Often she stood up the better to catch the wireless scent messages. Though vigilant, she was not worried. She was even inclined to play. While standing on her hind feet she struck at a passing grasshopper with her one forepaw, but she missed. Instantly, while still standing, she struck playfully this way and that, wheeling entirely about as she struck the last time.

From her tracks I noticed that she had been ranging over the middle and lower slopes of her territory, eating elderberries and choke-cherries below and kinnikinick and wintergreen berries in the higher slopes. Once, when I saw her rise up suddenly near me, there were elder bush tops with red berries dangling from them in her mouth. After a brief pause she went on with her feast. Having only one forefoot, she was evidently greatly handicapped in all digging operations and also in the tearing to pieces of logs. Bears frequently dig out mice and small mammals and overturn rotten logs and rip them open for the ants and grubs which they contain.

The last year that I had news concerning the Echo Mountain grizzly she was seen with two young cubs on the shore of a beaver pond a few miles southwest of Grand Lake. Berry pickers saw her a few times on Echo Mountain and her tracks were frequently seen.