Characteristics and Habits 8i 



There is some difference of opinion as to their habits 

 further south, and some authorities claim that at the 

 extreme southern hmit of their range the bears belong- 

 ing to the Black Bear group do not hibernate at all. 

 I incline, however, from what I have seen — or rather 

 failed to see — to the opposite belief; for in parts of Old 

 Mexico where, in the spring, I have seen many bears, I 

 have again in the winter time failed to see either them 

 or their fresh tracks, and upon making inquiry of the 

 Indians have been told that they were asleep. 



Moreover, Mr. Charles Sheldon, of New York, who 

 for fifteen years has made a close study of bears in their 

 natural state and has spent four years in Mexico study- 

 ing bear and sheep, informs me that all the bears den up 

 almost as early in those mountains as they do further 

 north, and that he has never seen bears in Mexico come 

 out of winter quarters earlier than in the United States. 



There has been much scientific discussion as to the 

 nature of this long sleep, and also much popular mis- 

 conception in regard to its outward manifestations. I 

 do not aspire to a voice in the former, but can speak 

 from considerable experience in regard to the latter. 

 Many, perhaps most, people seem to think that a bear 

 that has denned up for the winter is in some mysterious, 

 and more or less complete state of coma; that its 

 breathing is all but suspended, and that it would be 

 difficult, even by violence, to rouse it. They are 

 very far from the truth. Bears sleep, but are easily 



