Is love too strong a word to use for an animal? Or is love such a basic emotion that any sentient being with a sense of self can feel it? You decide. Faith treats Hope like a surrogate mother. She seeks her out to play. She follows Hope more readily than she follows Lily. Today, when ultra-wary Hope was startled and ran, Faith hesitated a moment beside Lily and then ran after Hope. When the two were deep enough in the woods to feel safe, Faith initiated wrestling.
Hope is usually the first to run at any hint of danger. Is this a holdover from her time alone? Can bears have post traumatic stress disorder? That seems just a possible as love for wary animals that live their lives with caution. When she is running for a tree or diving back into the den (last spring), she does it with an unusual desperation, like “Everybody watch out. I’m coming through!”
Faith and Hope are a joy to watch together or with Lily. In the first picture, taken June 11, Faith leaped from a stump onto Hope’s back and playfully bit her neck before getting shaken off.
Lily’s mammae are still swollen and full. Lily is the only mother we know with a yearling at this point. It’s looking more and more like Hope will get an extra year with the family.
Thank you for all you do.
—Lynn Rogers and Sue Mansfield, Biologists, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center