So many folks warn me to not get too close to the bears, or to not get eaten by a bear, or to watch out for those bears. Or as my brother so aptly put it, "Mort, if you're not careful, you're gonna get a huge chunk bitten out of your ass!" He said that after I told him that I had been out in the field on my first guided hike, and I actually got to watch 2 male bears fight for the same female. They weren't that very far away from us; we had front row seats to watch the show. One of the first things we saw upon entering the Meadow that evening, was a pair of grizzlies who were mates. After a time we also noticed this other bear lurking about in the bushes and trees at the edge of the meadow. John said right off, "It's another male, and he's lusty". At one point the bear who already had the girl charged Mr. Lusty, and that was a show in itself. Mr. Lusty didn't fight back then; he just retreated. But the first bear sure put on a show of prowess, by swatting at some trees and breaking branches. I guess he was showing that he's gonna fight to keep his woman if he has to. We were just sitting on the log enjoying the lovely evening and keeping our eyes on the 4 bears that we could see. Well, the 3 bears that we could see. The fourth one was Mr. Lusty, still lurking on the edges of the Meadow. Soon the mating pair crossed the stream that was over to our left. They knew we were there, they'd look at us and deem us to be completely unimportant. They came awfully close, though, and crossed the stream right in front of us and went to the meadow on the other side of the stream, where there was this other bear whom we dubbed Teddy Bear because of his perfect features. He looked just like a huggable teddy bear. John thought it wouldn't be very prudent to go and give him a hug, though. LOL Teddy Bear made room for Mr. and Mrs, and the 3 just went about their business, grazing. But for some reason, this brought Mr. Lusty out of the shadows. He came lumbering out across the meadow doing his 'cowboy walk' as the Hallo Bay Bear Camp folks call it. When they are feeling macho, and are challenging another bear, they spraddle their hind legs as far apart as they can, and they approach each other that way. It looks hilarious! They do walk like a bowlegged cowboy who just got bucked off, and it's a bit painful for him to walk. LOL Mr Lusty followed the path that the mating pair had taken. He also crossed the stream right in front of us. He entered the meadow on the other side where the other 3 bears were. That didn't go down to well with the first bear whom we shall call Married Guy. They were both doing the 'cowboy walk'. They circled each other, postured, all the while growling and carrying on. All of a sudden, they both roared, rose up on their hind feet and just attacked each other. It was fierce, and voilent. Before the fight actually started we could feel the electricity or tension or whatever you wanna call it in the air, and it was hair-raising. Perhaps it was bear testosterone, I don't know, but it was there! The fight didn't last that long, and there was no blood drawn. They growled and circled each other for a while longer then Married Guy went back to be with his woman. I guess he won the fight. His woman had left the meadow; went up over a small hill and down the other side towards the beach. Teddy Bear had also left the meadow before the fight, and I hadn't seen where he'd gone, I was too busy watching the show of the other 2 male bears. That left Mr Lusty in the meadow, and he was agitated. He was pacing and grumbling to himself. John thought we should just kindly leave our log and head over the rise towards the beach to where he can't see us. An agitated bear is completey unpredictable. We slowly stood up and went to move away from the log, with our eyes all on Mr. Lusty. He had apparently forgotten about us until we stood up. He took one look at us and took off, just galloping through the meadow, out the other side. We were glad that he ran away from us! We decided to go up over the rise anyway. I was thinking that the mating pair could have followed the hill and come this way on the other side of the hill. John was thinking the same thing. We very cautiously poked our heads up and sure enough! There were the 2 bears! Strolling along just under the peak of that rise, and we were just on the other side. With a few steps we could have reached out and touched them. Again, they looked at us and went on their way. In the meantime Teddy Bear wants back in the meadow. While we were facing the 2 bears over the rise, he comes strolling in behind us. ~~WHEW~ I didn't know whether to look forward or backward for a while there, but they all just went about their business without bothering us. Thank God! So do the bears leave us alone? Yes, unless we cause it to be otherwise. Human beings are the last thing that bears want to eat. We are on the bottom of their food chain. It's up to us to leave the bears alone and not irritate them in any way or to feed them in any way. Bears like to eat, and if we provide food for them, they will come back. If we do it once, we'll have to do it again or deal with a very angry, hungry bear. For over 20 years, Hallo Bay has been there in the Katmai Wilderness (now the Katmai National Park) and they have a perfect safety record. All food MUST be eaten inside the galley. One may not even go out on the porch to finish your sandwich or cookie or apple. The bears do come and stroll through camp now and then, but they don't look at us as a source of food. So they let us be. And we have not yet made them mad in any way so they leave us alone. We do pack lunches for the guests so they don't have to come back to the camp in the middle of the day, but there are also strict rules about not dropping crumbs or anything. If you do drop crumbs or some food, it must be picked up with the dirt that is around whatever you dropped. Timothy Treadwell was eaten by the grizzlies, because he tried to become one of them. That's simply not cool. Wouldn't it irritate you if you were a bear, and this completely foreign creature horns in on your business and makes a pest of himself? He just totally got in their way. Bears do attack people. It will happen. There are different reasons for it. Angry mama bear, or wounded bear, or a bear coming back for food and there is none, or a bear trying to find a mate and isn't being successful. May and June are the 2 most dangerous months of the year to be watching the bears. The bears are not long out of hibernation, and are hungry. They're also looking for a mate, and are spoiling for a fight. Even the mama bears will keep far away from the male bears this time of year. As Fannie so aptly put it, they are hungry and horny. We also have rules about how close we can come to bears. We must NEVER approach them, but if we are sitting and staying in one spot and the bears approach us, it's ok, but if they come too close we make moves to try to get them to go away. We'll stand up and act aggresive, yell at them, wave our arms. Most of the time they will leave. If they keep coming, we'll flare them with our marine flares. That's supposed to stop them. Whatever happens, DO NOT RUN!!! They will forever keep that knowledge in their heads and approach folks just to make them run. One can tell by their body language if he's aggressive or curious or playful. But never, never, never let down your guard around bears! So far the way Hallo Bay has treated the bears and been treated by the bears has been very successful, and there has not been one incident in over 20 years where someone got hurt by a bear. It just takes common sense. | 
I miss her, too. And the Bug. I needed a bug hug.