And it wasn't that hard despite his lack of standout identification marks. When we went through old pictures, there was Levi, the first visitor of 2025 (March 29) showing his similar facial pattern of dark and light with a tiny white scar in the exact same place on the top of the muzzle between the eyes. In addition we remembered how similar he behaved. Nothing contradicted our concurrence that the mystery bear of this year was 5-year-old Levi whose ancestors are Shadow, RC, Bow, and his mother Daisy.
Levi on 3-29-25
Knowing the identities and histories of bears that visit year after year lets us not only learn their ways and needs, it lets us learn their personalities and how consistent each individual is. When I saw how comfortable Levi was with me coming out the door to see his reaction, I knew he was a bear we had pictures of and could eventually determine his identity.
Now, at five, I suspect Levi will be competitive in the upcoming mating season in late May to early July. He evidently is a local bear that we'll get to watch as he interacts with his potential mates and competitors.
Redpoll
A bit of a treat was redpolls stopping by on their way to their summer range in Canada, making me wonder how far they had to go yet. Their range map showed them to be only 380 miles from the south edge of their range but over 1200 miles to the north edge on the shore of the Arctic Ocean.
Fisher
The next adventure of the day was the first fisher I've seen for months. I noticed it when the deer in the yard stopped their foraging and cud-chewing to focus totally on the fisher. I soon saw that the two chicken drumsticks I'd put out for the eagle weren't going to last long. 
Fisher eats drumstickIt apparently wasn't the fisher's first visit. It knew where to look for them. Wrapping its mouth around one and then the other, it ran off with both of them only to come back a couple minutes later looking for more. When it left shortly, I put two more drumsticks out for the eagle, but they didn't last long either. Two herring gulls swallowed them and flew off. Putting two more out for the eagle, the fisher got them again and that was the last I saw of it. The eagle then took over, swooping down to grab one the moment I went inside and shut the door. Putting out more and more, I twice saw him carry off drumsticks toward his nest where his mate is busy incubating only a mile away.
Bald eagle flying
Later, one of the gulls that had swallowed a drumstick came back without a bulging throat and sat outside my window looking at me. Finally, it dawned on me. It was a gull that the year before had learned to catch and eat slices of bologna I would go to the door and toss to it. As I got up from my desk, the gull flew to the usual catching spot and caught slide after slice. It had remembered the routine over winter.
Finally, Levi came about 4 PM. I gave him a big helping of sunflower seeds, wanting him to continue coming here for a good long life. In years of berry crop failures when bears elsewhere are being shot wholesale for seeking garbage and bird seed in residential areas, bears here are being welcomed with substantial diversionary food at a dozen households and staying out of trouble. As a result, bears in this area become some of the oldest bears in Minnesota, including Shadow, the second oldest black bear on record.
Thank you for all you do,
Lynn Rogers, Biologist, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center