Bears Build Bed - Close to Hibernation Now!

On Thursday morning, November 18th, Grinder and Coola suddenly decided it was time to build their hibernation bed! We had provided them with lots of nice soft fir branches a couple weeks before hand but they had gone largely ignored until today. The trigger for their bed building was probably our dropping temperatures and our first serious dump of snow. The snow, cold and short days are all triggers that the bears should begin their winter sleep.

It was all over in a couple short hours and the bears were enjoying their new mattress! As the snow continues to build over the next few days the bears will spend an increasing amount of time sleeping inside. Once we are sure they are spending most of the day inside the den we will close the outer door to their 'bear hotel' and they will spend the winter inside.

Here are a few screen shots of the bed making activity from our infrared cameras inside the den - remember it's pitch black in there!

An Empty Den

Grinder checking out the den.

The first few branches are dragged in.

Testing out the first branches.

Time for more!

A view of the new mattress.

Coola and Grinder test it out together.

Ahhhh perfect!

Bears ready for hibernation!

Grinder and Coola are now inhabiting their hibernation habitat around their bear den. Both bears are super plump and have put on more weight than in previous years - maybe this is a sign of a long and cold winter to come?

They are spending their days laying around with the occasional foray to eat, although food is being left behind each day which is a sign that the bears are happy with their weight and feel prepared for the upcoming winter.

Yesterday we provided them with a huge mound of Silver-fir branches which they will drag into their sleeping quarters and use to create a mattress of branches for their long winter sleeps. As of this morning they have not begun to create a bed but it shouldn't be far off as we received a few inches of fresh snow today.

After we've received our first significant snow fall we will cut off food and this lack of food, combined with short days and cold, snowy, weather will trigger hibernation.

Here are a few shots of Grinder lounging around the hibernation habitat!

Bird Calls at Night

For the past few weeks here on Grouse Mountain, if you wandered around late at night, you would have heard a strange cacophony of bird calls and sounds that you never hear in the light of the day.

These are the calls of the nocturnal migrants. Many bird species migrate at night for safety. Predators such as bird's of prey are not active, and because temperatures are cooler, less energy is spent in staying cool during the long demanding flights of migration. It's the equivalent of going for a late evening or early morning job before the heat of the day hits.

As always, there is safety in numbers so many species, or even mixes of species, migrate together and stay in touch through contact calls. Due to poor visibility, contact calls are the best way to stay in touch with your neighboring migrants during the night. Many of these flocks touch down briefly or pass overhead of the local mountains while flying at altitude. This is why we can hear them so clearly on top of Grouse Mountain.

It's an amazing experience to hear a chorus of birds at one o'clock in the morning! Experts study radar images of migration to determine the quantity and timing of migration. Vast flocks of thousands of birds show up as distincts groupings on radar images and allow ornithologists to study this unique phenomena.

Peeking at Pikas

While walking near the ski runs on Grouse Mountain you might hear an occasional sound that resembles a squeeker from a dog toy. This sound, an alarm call, is coming from a small diurnal (active during the day) mammal known as a Pika, which inhabits the rocky terrain found around the mountain.

The American Pika (Ochotona princeps) is the species of Pika that is common to western North America and they are normally found above the tree line in the alpine. However, they are known to adapt to any area at elevation where large rock fields are created, such as ski runs.

Pika's are members of order Lagomorpha, which includes rabbits and hares. They are strict herbavores who feed on a variety of alpine grasses and leaves. They do not hibernate in the winter time, but rather store caches of dried vegetation to feed on in the cold winter months. They can be seen during the summer months both feeding and drying out their grasses for the coming winter season.

Watch and listen for this curious little mammal next time you are walking on talus or rocky slopes!

Here's a picture taken today on Grouse Mountain:

Barn Swallow Nestlings Ready to Fledge!

Hello everyone,

Every summer we find hundreds of Barn Swallows calling Grouse Mountain their summer home. This year has been no exception. These birds can be found zipping and diving all over the mountian in their endless pursuit of insects to feed on. They can also be seen diving into the bear ponds for either a quick drink or a quick bath!

Barn Swallows are the most wide-spread species of swallow and can be found throughout the Northern Hemisphere in the summertime. They migrate south for the winter before returning each spring.

When they arrive at the start of May they will begin to gather mouthfuls of mud which they use to construct nests that are attached to buildings, usually under the eaves or other shelter from the weather. Interestingly enough, while they used to also nest on cliff faces, they have come to rely on man-made structures and now nest exclusively on them.

After hatching, young Barn Swallows grow quickly, with both the adult male and female birds feeding them, and after 18-23 days the young are ready to leave the nest. We've been watching one nest that was constructed on top of a light bulb of the building where we store our bear food. The young birds are now very close fledgling and within a couple days should be following mom and dad around the mountain and learning how to catch their food!

Here are some shots from this morning - enjoy!

Grizzly Bears Enjoy a Good Summer Splash

Hi everyone! The weather has turned warm over these last couple of weeks and that means only one thing to the bears - pool time! These days it is quite common to see Grinder and Coola hanging out in one of their three ponds within their five acre habitat. Sometimes it's a quick dip and other times they will be in for hours.

Both Grinder and Coola have stashed some of their favourite items, including old bones, branches, grass clumps and an old shovel handle, in the mud at the bottom of the ponds. It is not uncommon to see them with their heads submerged (ears poking out of course!) and paws active as they search the bottom for where they last left their items. Today, Coola was playing with an old bone and was twirling it between his front paws and his back and finally flipped it up into the air. It was quite comical to watch!

Also, what would a pond be without a little playful wrestling? Grinder and Coola can be found having a good ol'fashioned pool fight usually at least once per day. This includes splashing, dunking and jumping on one another. I don't think they've ever heard about the rule of no running on the pool deck either!

Here's some shots from this morning:

Baby Boom Continues on Grouse Mountain!

Walking around the mountain top these days is like walking around one giant wildlife nursery! Baby birds of all species have left the nest and are following their parents around and are feeding on their own for the first time in their lives. Baby mammals, such as deer and black bear, can be seen doing likewise.

It always amazes me to see wildlife adapt to human structures and developments. Birds especially can be remarkably adaptable to nesting in or on man-made objects. Numerous Barn Swallow nests are located in the eves and rafters of our buildings here and just recently we found out about a Northern Flicker nest located in one of our Glen Greensides statues of a Basketball Player (see photos below).

Northern Flickers, a type of woodpecker, excavate cavities in both living and dead trees. These cavities can take up to two weeks to construct. Great care is taken in choosing the location and direction of the opening to the cavity. Woodpeckers are careful not to excavate above a branch, where rainwater could enter and fill up the hole. Also, the entrance is usually orientated south and east to get the maximum amount of sun and daylight (especially in more northerly locations). You can usually tell which species of woodpecker have excavated a cavity because the opening will be just large enough to allow an adult bird to enter it. The parent birds then line the cavity with a bed of wood chips on which they lay two to six eggs.

The cavity we found on the statue was rather large, indicating it was a Northern Flicker nest and not one of our other common woodpeckers such as a Red-breasted Sapsucker, and its entrance was indeed facing southeast! When taking the photos below I waited for some time for the parents to return to feed the young adult male flicker but they did not show up.

Returning the next morning I found the young bird had fledged (left the nest) and was resting on a nearby statue. The parent birds will often encourage the young to leave the nest by holding off on feeding them just long enough that the young bird is hungry enough to brave the outside world. The parents then protect and watch over the fledgling while it learns to forage and strengthens its muscles for flight.

I hope you enjoy the photos and before we know it this young guy will be tapping on trees, vocalizing loudly and otherwise proclaiming himself to the world.

Baby Wildlife Appearing on Grouse Mountain!

Hello everyone! Spring is changing into summer (albeit slowly!) and with that change the first young animals of the year are starting to appear. We've already seen young deer following their mothers around, and black bears with cubs wandering the high areas of the mountain. In addition to the baby mammals, our feathered wildlife has also been busy and we've spotted the first young Robins out of their nest within the last week and some young barn swallows within their mud-nests.

Just the other day we saw a pair of Dark-eyed Juncos feeding their young in a dense shrub near the Grizzly Bear Habitat. The shrub offers excellent protection from predators and if it weren't for spotting the adults entering the shrub with food we would probably never have known they were there! I've attached some photos taken with a telephoto lens (please remember to respect the birds and don't get too close or distruptive if you are photographing a nesting location. Never remove the protective cover to get a better shot as the babies rely heavily on this for safety). Hope you enjoy!

Grinder and Coola Emerge from Hibernation!

Grinder and Coola, our two resident Grizzly Bears, have emerged from their 2009/2010 hibernation period at the Grouse Mountain Refuge for Endangered Wildlife.

This was their ninth hibernation - all have taken place at the Refuge.

Grinder, being the bold, head strong bear, was the first to emerge and was followed shortly by Coola (shown to the left).

After a little over four months in hibernation, the bears were ready to rumble and immediately started to run and play in the snow. It's always one of their most energetic days of the year and for the rest of the afternoon Grinder and Coola were seen wrestling each other or rubbing their coats, dirty from hibernation, in the clean snow. Of course, they are also out of shape, so these periods of activities were followed by some serious bear napping!

The term 'hibernation' is a bit of a misnomer when talking about bears. Grizzly Bears are not true hibernators and instead enter a period of deep sleep more correctly called Winter Dormancy. During this period they do not defecate, urinate, eat or drink, however their body temperature and heart rate does not drop as drastically as true hibernators, instead they slow down. Also, bears quite often go for 'sleep walks' during the winter to stretch their muscles and keep their bones strong.

We will soon be switching our hibernation cameras out onto the habitats to allow Grinder and Coola's fans to watch them in action in their habitat. Please stay tuned!

Hummingbirds return to Grouse Mountain!

Yesterday marked the first sighting of 2010 of Hummingbirds on Grouse Mountain!

For the past five years Grouse Mountain has sponsored a Hummingbird Monitoring Project that has led to interesting research and findings about hummingbirds in a sub-alpine environment.

Every two weeks our wildlife staff go out and count hummingbirds coming to feeders, band each bird with a microscopic bird band and take important measurements and data on the age and sex of the bird. This data is then compiled with other stations throughout Western North America to provide a more complete picture of what is happening with hummingbird populations and migration.

Contrary to the myth, Hummingbirds do not migrate on the backs of other birds - they do the journey all under their own power! The most common hummingbird in the Vancouver area is the Rufous Hummingbird. These amazing birds complete a migration from Mexico to as far north as Alaska each year before doing the return journey in the late summer after they are done breeding. If you consider body size to distance travelled, the Rufous Hummingbird has the longest migration ratio of any bird!

Please watch for these amazing birds at our feeding and monitoring station behind our outdoor plaza (aka Ice Rink) when you next visit Grouse Mountain!

Work Begins on the Hibernation Habitat

For the past week we've been working away at clearing some of the snow and setting up Grinder and Coola's hibernation habitat.

The bears have begun to move around more frequently and have been seen looking out of their den at their habitat. This is to be expected given our slightly warmer temperatures and longer daylight hours.

If all goes to plan the habitat should be ready in the next week or two and the bears will be able to come out and play in the snow. It is always a really exciting day when the bears first emerge. They love the snow and spend most of the day romping around, wrestling and rolling in the snow to clean their fur after a long winter's dormancy.

Spring approaches...

Whew, things have been a little hectic here on Grouse Mountain for the past few weeks with first the Olympic Games and now the Paralympic Games. For the entire Olympic period, the NBC Today Show was broadcasting from the mountain top and there was a flurry of activity everywhere you looked. Yet, through this all Grinder and Coola remained mostly asleep.

The last week of February was unusually warm and the bears stirred enough to prompt us into starting the fenceline of their Hibernation Habitat (the area directly outside of the bear hotel and the first section of habitat we put up each year). But, as it's want to do, as soon as we started on the fence, the snow came fast and hard. We had to delay fence construction, but it did not matter as Grinder and Coola had gone back into a deeper sleep. Now, however, a couple weeks later, things are warming up a bit and they are beginning to move around a lot more, as you can see on our den camera . Both bears are still looking chubby, probably due to the milder winter we had this year, but both look to be in excellent health.

Once we are sure Mother Nature does not plan for any more large dumps of snow we will finish off the habitat and open the doors to the bear hotel. But for now we wait and see...

For those of you who missed them, the NBC Today Show did two video features on our refuge. They focus on our pack of Timber Wolves, but Grinder and Coola do make an appearance! You can view them on our wildlife video page.

More updates to follow!

Bears Continue to Hibernate

Even though temperatures have risen slightly in the last couple of weeks, Grinder and Coola continue their hibernation and can be viewed spending most of the day in their sleeping den.

The boys are still active from time to time and can be seen stretching, grooming or going for a bit of a wander every once in a while. This movement keeps their bones and muscles strong during the winter dormancy period. The fact that bears get up and roam around during this period indicates that they are not true hibernators (in which body temperatures drastically decrease and an animal is torpid) and rather enter a period of dormancy with periods of minimal activity.

You can watch Grinder and Coola live on our hibernation video feed found at http://www.grousemountain.com/Winter/wildlife-education/refuge/grizzly-bear-live-camera.asp .