Black Bears - Waterton Lakes National Park
All pictures on this page were taken in June, 2001 in Waterton Lakes National Park, Alberta Canada. This park is in the southwestern corner of Alberta and is adjacent to Glacier National Park in the U.S. All images on this page were taken with a Canon EOS 3 camera and Sigma 50-500 mm lens on Fuji Provia 100F film exposed at ISO 320 and push processed two stops. A Manfrotto 055PRO tripod and 468RC ball head were also used.
Not all black bears are black. This is a black bear with cinnamon phase colouration. This distinguished young bear is known to be outstanding in his field.
Well, Hello there. This friendly bear came in close for a good look at the hikers who were visiting one of his favorite grazing meadows.
Having checked out the visitors, the bear headed out into his meadow and took one more look at the spectators before starting lunch.
The bear is enjoying a mixed spring salad, but seems to have a real taste for dandylions. I should get one of these things for my front lawn.
The cool looking bear came out on the trail for one last look at his visitors as they were leaving. I thought he was going to ask, "Got a light, buddy?"
This was a nasty tempered bear who tried to provoke a confrontation. You can see that his ears are back instead of up like the less aggressive bears seen previously. This guy was spotted well up the trail, grazing on the side. We decided to wait until he left before we passed. Then the bear came out on the trail and started walking directly towards us, as pictured above. I told the others to back up slowly, but wanted to stay in the front of the group because I was the only one with bear spray. The bear kept coming, quicker than we were backing up. It passed the place where we were standing, so it must have had our scent. When the bear was less than 10 meters away I glanced over my shoulder to see how the others were doing. To my surprise they had been backing up much more quickly than I, so I was close to the bear than the other hikers. I decided this had to stop before it got any more serious so I stamped my foot, raised my camera and bear spray in the air to look bigger and yelled, "Hey!" The bear stopped, but appeared uncertain about what to do next. My wife had the dog on a leash, so I asked her to bring the dog forward. As soon as the border collie got even with me, she realized what her job was and started growling and standing up on her back legs. Finaly the bear started to turn so the dog upped the intensity of her display. The bear first started to walk back up the trail, then broke into a run. As soon as the bear was running the dog went into her fierces barking and growling modes to keep the bear moving until it was well off the trail. I think that despite her show, the dog was glad to be on a leash so she didn't have to actually chase the bear. The bear stopped in a meadow, well off the trail. We passed, but kept the bear spray ready just in case. I am happy to report that I have still never fired my bear spray.
The conduct of this bear did not give us much choice but to stand up force it to back off. We could have tried to get off the trail and let the bear go by, but could not tell what the animals intentions were. We did not want to get into a position where we were cornered. The bear may have just been curious, either about the camera or the dog. It did not come towards us until I clicked the shutter for a picture. The bear did not charge or otherwise act threatening. It may have just been establishing that this was its terrain and it wanted our respect. It got it!