By now, the four radio-collared bears have undoubtedly settled into dens, but record warm weather delayed ice formation on the lakes and made it impossible to cross lakes or land airplanes on them to find dens.   Two of the dens have not yet been located. 

The reason there are only four radio-collared bears rather than the seven we radio-collared is that three lost their collars or had them removed. 

We had radio-collared two of Shadow's cubs in August so we could follow the family to a den.  We would have just radio-collared Old Shadow herself, but she always looked at us like it was not a wise thing to do.  She watched unconcerned as we radio-collared her cubs Will (short for willow) and Hazel (short for hazelnut).  They both kept their collars on for over a month, so we thought we were home free and had an unnecessary extra collar on the family.  Then Blackie showed up, one of the largest female bears we ever saw, and we wondered where she came from.  We took the lightweight collar off Will on September 19 and put it on Nipper, one of Blackie's cubs.  That left Hazel still collared to show us Shadow's den, but about the time the family disappeared for the winter, Hazel's signal started coming from the same place every day.  The breakaway portion of the collar had failed prematurely and the collar fell off in the second week of October.  We went out and picked up the collar on October 12 at one of the beds the family had used in a cedar swamp in preparation for hibernation.  Bears commonly bed down near water and continue to drink for a few days after they stop eating in preparation for hibernation.  This family had stopped eating a few days earlier.  We'll put the collar back on Hazel next spring before she leaves her mother. 

That leaves Donna, the yearling daughter of Blackheart and grand-daughter of Shadow.   She was growing so we loosened her collar on September 1.  We loosened it too much.  She took it off.  We collared her again September 8, but she took it off again, and that was the last we saw her for the year.   We are hoping to see her next spring.   

The remaining four bears were available to follow to dens.  

Blackheart, the 4-year-old female, was the first of the four radio-collared bears to call it a year.  She stopped eating September 11 and bedded down.  Sometime between then and October 11, she raked leaves into an opening under a brush pile at the edge of a recent clearcut and went to sleep.  The question now is whether or not she will produce cubs in January.  She gained weight rapidly after she recovered from being hit by a truck.  She weighed 254 by August 2.  This put her on track to weigh more than enough to produce cubs this January if her injuries from being hit didn't otherwise prevent it. 

RC, a 2-year-old female, was the second to call it a year.  On September 18, she stopped eating and began preparing a den 80 yards from a forest road.  She raked leaves from a 20-foot radius to create a deep bed on the ground and stayed there for nearly two months until mid-November.   Near the end of deer hunting season in mid-November, she abandoned that den, possibly disturbed by a deer hunter.  The day after deer season ended, November 19, she was a mile from the den resting in a cedar swamp.  The next three days, she rested in several more locations and then moved a mile to an area where she remained.  RC weighed 158 pounds on August 4 and probably weighed over 200 by September 18, which would make her heavy enough to produce cubs in January.  The next question for her is whether she will still do that after draining reserves moving in November.   

Dot, the yearling daughter of Blackheart, was at a freshly dug den on October 7 and has been there ever since. 

Blackie and her three cubs were the last to retire.  Blackie is one of the largest females we have seen in 34 years of study.  She had the wide head of a bear in her teens or twenties, but we had never seen her anywhere in the area before August 11.   By that late date in summer, forty percent of the females in the region are away from their territories, so we wondered if she was from far away.  In years when natural food is scarce, as it was this past summer, these trips can be extra long.   Tent caterpillars had defoliated many of the nut and berry bushes across the region in June, ruining the nut and berry crops before they ripened.  Since females are killed on the average at five years of age in hunted areas, we wondered if she had traveled to the study area from a roadless area where hunting pressure is light.  She continued eating in the study area through October 16, and two days later left the study area.  By October 20, she was 4 miles away.  By November 12, she was 44 miles away, resting in a cedar swamp that is probably in her usual territory.  If it is, the area helps explain her longevity.  It was nearly roadless.  One road, only a few years old, goes through her area.  We will remove the collar from the cub this winter and hopefully ear-tag the whole family to see if any of them ever show up again in our study area so far from their home.