FUR FACTS 157 



There has been much scientific discussion as to the nature of this 

 long sleep, and also much popular misconception in regard to its 

 outward manifestations. 



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 roused, quick to scent 

 danger, and ready to abandon their retreat and look up a new one 

 if they think it necessary. 



Since they lay up no store of provisions, it is known that the 

 bear does not eat during its long retirement, and although, in the 

 north, it would be possible for it to provide itself with water by eating 

 the snow that shuts it in, it is known that bears hibernating in 

 captivity (a thing that seldom occurs) neither eat nor drink. An 

 odd fact about the whole proceeding is that all bears of the same 

 class in the same locality go into winter quarters and emerge from 

 them within a few days of each other. 



During this hibernation the cubs are born. Some authorities 

 believe that the grizzly bear breeds every year; this is true of the 

 black bear but, one authority says, "I am inclined to believe that the 

 grizzly bear breeds every two years. The black bear takes care of the 

 young for the first season only and will wean them before going into 

 winter quarters while the grizzly mother will den up and hibernate 

 with her cubs." 



Probably the explanation of this very striking difference of 

 habit between the black and 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 blood-thirsty 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, un- 

 natural as this seems to us, it is true of any or most carnivorous, or 

 partly carnivorous, animal. 



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. A famous hunter and naturalist, says regarding this: "I 

 have on two different occasions known of a male grizzly killing and 



