86 The Black Bear 



I believe that the explanation of this very striking 

 difference of habit between the Black and the grizzly 

 bears in the matter of breeding annually or biennially, 

 is to be found in their different degrees of fierceness, and 

 in the resulting fact that the Black Bear cubs are not so 

 long in danger from the evil tempers and bloodthirsty 

 dispositions of the grown males of their kind. 



A new-born cub of either species would be instantly 

 killed, and probably eaten, by any old male that got 

 the opportunity; and, unnatural as this seems to us, it 

 is true of many or most carnivorous, or partly carniv- 

 orous, animals. It is true of rats, as most boys who 

 have bred white rats have had occasion to discover. 

 The memory of the habit, at least, survives in the 

 fierceness with which even a pet dog with puppies will 

 keep the father of them away from her basket. In all 

 zoological gardens it is necessary to separate the male 

 bears from the female at and after the birth of cubs, 

 and the habits of mother bears in the woods show that 

 their instincts warn them very effectually of the wis- 

 dom of this course. 



But while the Black Bear mother shows no great 

 concern for the safety of her cubs after they have 

 reached the age of five or six months, the grizzly 

 mother continues, with good reason, to evade or resent 

 the approach of other members of her tribe till well 

 into the second year. I have on two different occa- 

 sions known of a male grizzly's killing and eating a cub 



