During the month of October our two Grizzly Bears, Grinder and Coola, seriously began their winter preparations. The boys entered their period of Hyperphagia, which is a fancy Greek word for 'pigging out', where they gain approximately 20% more body weight. As we enter November, Coola, the larger of the two bears, currently weighs in at 1030lbs - about 200 lbs over his summer weight of 800lbs! Grinder weighs in at 928lbs.
We recently reduced their habitat down to their hibernation area only. This assists us in packing away their larger summer fence for the winter so it doesn't get destroyed by the snow and also shows the bears that it is time to build their bed in the den!
We have supplied the bears with cut Amabilis Fir (Pacific Silver-Fir) branches and they have started to build a deep mattress with them inside the sleeping chamber of their den. Coola is known to do most of the mattress building with Grinder watching for supervision! Grinder has been known to pull a branch or two out if he isn't happy with Coola's placement!
The bears appetite is reducing daily as the days get shorter and temperatures fall. We are tapering off their food supply to imitate what would be happening in the wild. Once we receive our first solid snowfall we will cut the food off and this will initiate our 2018/2019 hibernation period here at the Grouse Mountain Refuge for Endangered Wildlife.
Please visit our webcam page at: https://www.grousemountain.com/web-cams
to view both the outside front of the hotel and the inside sleeping chamber cameras and follow along with their bed making and winter preparation endeavors.