Bear tracks around Jewel's denAnother first! We’ve talked about fecal plugs before, but we had no idea they were ever eaten. Today, Fern and Jewel made incontrovertible scientific history. It was all within view. Jewel’s yearling daughter Fern backed to the entrance of the den, visibly strained, and passed feces that had collected in her bowel over winter. It wasn’t easy. Defecating usually takes a minute or so. The big, hard fecal plug took Fern nearly 4 ½ minutes to pass.
Jewel eats Fern's fecal plugAlthough she hasn’t eaten solid food since last fall, dead cells have sloughed off the walls of her intestine and formed feces, just as happens in starving humans. 
Jewel in her denIn addition, anything ingested during the winter—hair, footpad pieces, bits of debris—contribute to form the first hard, dry, end-of-winter feces referred to as a ‘fecal plug.’ Jewel’s unexpected reaction to this fresh fecal plug in her den surprised us all as she got up and went over to it about 3 ½ minutes later and spent about 45 minutes carefully eating it. Biologists are fascinated by stuff like this.
Lily, Ellie, and EliWe’ll be watching over and over exactly how she ate it. Did she carefully nibble the outside off first like we think she did? Why would the outside be preferred and eaten first? It doesn’t take much to entertain biologists who have mostly been inside this snowy winter. If you’re as fascinated by this event as we are, a very graphic video is posted at http://youtu.be/93Yl-5WZchM. Viewer discretion is advised.
Ellie, Lily, and big footNothing about this is going to save the world, but it’s just one more thing Lily, Jewel, and their families have shown us all that no one knew before. Just because a bear’s diet seems a little strange to us humans doesn’t make us think any less of them. 
EllieJewel isn’t into licking faces anyway, so it makes no difference what she eats. Right? Maybe Jewel knows it’s April Fools’ Day, but she really did it nevertheless. We immediately added this first to the abstract on den behavior we sent in today.
EliIt was a watchful Lily Fan who alerted us to Jewel’s unusual behavior. Before seeing the video, we speculated that it could perhaps be dog feces. Lynn zipped out to Jewel’s den with Ted Parvu to check for dog tracks in the fresh snow from yesterday. None found. 
Ted Parvu works on Jewel's PTZTed worked on Jewel’s PTZ camera while Lynn played detective and snapped a quick picture of proud Jewel in the dusty den.
The temperature barely made it up to freezing today. After the above freezing temperatures of the past couple days, a crust is forming on the snow. Lily hasn’t tested it yet from what we saw of her brief emergences, but it’s likely the crust would hold the cubs, if not Lily, at this point. 
Eli does chin-ups from the raftersIt’s a good thing Lily has a radio-collar because when bears leave dens on a good crust, they hardly leave tracks. It’s supposed be above freezing the next couple days to melt a little more snow and make a stronger crust as it refreezes at night.
LilyWe’ll be looking for Lily’s fecal plug after she leaves the den. Hers will likely be super-sized because in addition to the usual contents, it contains all the feces she’s ingested from the growing cubs these nearly 12 weeks—as well as their afterbirths.
Ellie inspects the cameraLucky and Honey gave us weights today, but we can’t say what they are until Ted completes the trio and it is announced for the contest.
Another fun contest is afoot—this one sponsored by Verizon. Join the fun by guessing when Lily, Eli and Ellie will leave their den for good this year. Post your date in the comment section of the #vzwmidwest blog at http://bit.ly/11Vp929.
Thank you for all you do.
—Lynn Rogers and Sue Mansfield, Biologists, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center
All photos taken today unless otherwise noted.