"Alaskan Brown Bears at Play",4,01630067.bmp,d,062.wav
Bears have always fascinated, amused, and terrified man - and man often misinterprets their behavior. These Alaskan brown bears may appear ready to fight (as sometimes they do, ferociously) but their sitting positions indicate nothing more serious than rough play.
\BPhoto:\b Todtri Productions Limited
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"Polar Bear Leaps",5,34690040.bmp,d,064.wav
A large male polar bear leaps to an ice floe -- not to avoid the water but simply because this is the quickest, easiest way to get there. A polar bear can swim 50 miles (80 kilometers) without resting.
\BPhoto:\b Walt Enders - Ellis Nature Photography
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"Fishing in Alaska",6,01630093.bmp,d,065.wav
With ample fishing room for all, several bears gather on rock slabs and gravel bars in the McNeil River, Alaska. Gulls gather in force to pluck scattered morsels and discarded skins. Bears tolerate the birds until they become bothersome, then growl and lunge, temporarily scattering them.
\BPhoto:\b Todtri Productions Limited
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"Own Fishing Style",7,27040006.bmp,c,066.wav
Every bear seems to develop its own fishing style, probably based on initial successes. Most face downstream or across-stream to intercept fish swimming upstream, but this Alaskan brown succeeds by "tailing" them.
\BDescription:\b
\BPhoto:\b Todtri Productions Limited
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"Cubs Use Eyes to Search",8,01630023.bmp,c,067.wav
These grizzly cubs, trying to follow their mother's example, are using their eyes to search for some unfamiliar presence she has already seen. With \Pmuzzle\p raised, the mother is testing the air -- using her nose, not her eyes.
\BPhoto:\b Todtri Productions Limited
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"Search For Food",9,34690002.bmp,d,068.wav
The polar bear's diet consists mainly of ringed seals (the Arctic's most abundant large mammal), bearded seals, and an occasional disabled walrus. Here a mother and cub search for food.
\BDescription:\b \BPhoto:\b Walt Enders - Ellis Nature Photography
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"Cub at Play",10,01630040.bmp,c,069.wav
This cub is not even one year old. When playing in trees, cubs will often clamber onto a higher branch and swat at a sibling below, but rarely, if ever, is a cub dislodged.
\BPhoto:\b Todtri Productions Limited
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"Brown Bears Sparring",11,34700021.bmp,c,070.wav
All bears love water -- if it provides a food resource. These are grizzly brown bears in the act of disputing fishing rights. They may be siblings, and their sparring will be brief and bloodless.
A young brown bear practices its budding fishing skills.
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\BPhoto:\b Gerry Ellis - Ellis Nature Photography
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"Not All Polar Bears Are White",13,27040018.bmp,d,072.wav
Although polar bears are more uniform in hue than other ursine species, they do not always look white. When the sun is low in the Arctic, they can appear golden, and in summer and autumn their fur is often "rested" by the oxidizing effect of the sun.
The brown bear at left may be standing in chest-deep water, but the one at right is probably sitting. If this were a serious battle, each would rise up, standing as high as possible while biting and slapping at its adversary.
\BDescription:\b
\BPhoto:\b Todtri Productions Limited
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"Walk Through the Woods",15,01630047.bmp,c,074.wav
A black bear walking through the woods will generally flee at the approach of a human, but if startled, it has been known to kill.
\BPhoto:\b Todtri Productions Limited
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"Brown Bear Growls",16,01630018.bmp,d,075.wav
Scientists believe that all of today's brown bears -- more than 50 subspecies occur in Asia, Europe, and North America -- evolved in China.
\BPhoto:\b Todtri Productions Limited
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"Spectacled Bear in Venezuela",17,01630087.bmp,c,076.wav
A spectacled bear, photographed in the Andes Mountains of Venezuela, exhibits the shaggy coat characteristic of the species. The facial markings on this specimen form broken eyebrows and a bib rather than spectacles.
\BDescription:\b
\BPhoto:\b Todtri Productions Limited
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"Polar Bear Catching a Scent of Prey",18,34690039.bmp,c,077.wav
A polar bear rises on its hind legs to savor a wind-carried scent of \Pprey\p -- most likely a seal. Eskimo and Indian legends described bears as the beasts that stand like a man, and sometimes referred to them as spiritual relatives, calling them such names as Grandmother or Brother.
A polar bear gnaws packed snow from its paws. This may be how some polar bears have learned to hold one paw in a similar position, camouflaging the black nose, while stalking a seal.
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\BPhoto:\b Walt Enders - Ellis Nature Photography
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"Cooling Stop",20,27040038.bmp,c,079.wav
Sometimes a rest stop can also serve as a cooling stop. On snow-strewn ice, a yearling polar bear sprawls flat, pressing as much of its body as possible against the frigid surface.
\BDescription:\b
\BPhoto:\b Todtri Productions Limited
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"Better Vision Than You Realise",21,01630080.bmp,c,080.wav
Bears have better vision than most observers realize, but are thought to be fully or partially color-blind. It is undoubtedly scent that often attracts them to flowering plants, which in many cases provide excellent nutrition.
A brown bear grazes in a meadow edging an Alaskan stream. Grass is among the earliest vegetation to become lush after bears emerge from their dens, and provides nutrition in a moist, easily digestible form that seems to help the animals start their alimentary systems functioning normally again.
\BDescription:\b
\BPhoto:\b Todtri Productions Limited
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"Alaskan Grizzly Bear in Lush Grasslands",23,01630062.bmp,d,082.wav
An Alaskan grizzly bear grazes as contentedly -- and gluttonously -- as a buffalo in lush grasslands. Bears consume large quantities of grass in spring and summer. Another kind of springtime feast is provided by skunk cabbage on stream banks and tidal flats.
\BPhoto:\b Todtri Productions Limited
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"Gray Bear",24,01630011.bmp,c,083.wav
This gray bear may look positively blue when the light is dim or hazy. Known as the blue bear or glacier bear, it was long regarded as a distinct species, but is actually a subspecies of the American black bear - found only at Yakutat Bay, Alaska, a mountainous coastal strip less than 100 miles (160 kilometers) long.
\BPhoto:\b Todtri Productions Limited
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"On the Hunt",25,01630068.bmp,d,084.wav
When on the hunt, an Alaskan brown bear is alert to every movement, sight, and scent.
Polar bears are such skillful underwater swimmers that they occasionally catch unwary fish. Sometimes they also swim underwater to sneak up on a seal that basks on the edge of an ice floe. They lunge up out of the water with incredible speed and force to snatch the \Pprey\p.
\BDescription:\b
\BPhoto:\b Todtri Productions Limited
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"Chasing Fish",27,01630100.bmp,c,086.wav
A half-grown brown bear runs through the shallows, chasing fish. The young learn the rudiments by watching their elders, but are generally overeager to try what they see. At first they tend to be very clumsy at catching fish, timing their grabs and lunges poorly.
\BDescription:\b
\BPhoto:\b Todtri Productions Limited
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"Nursing Her Cub",28,01630072.bmp,c,087.wav
A mother bear usually exhibits strong affection for her cubs until she accepts a new mate, at which time their mother or mate evicts them.
\BPhoto:\b Todtri Productions Limited
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"Cubs are Inquisitive But Still Stay Close to Mum",29,016300
